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Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumAntarctic flood produces 'ice crater' (subsurface lake draining into the sea)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23144184Scientists have seen evidence for a colossal flood under Antarctica that drained six billion tonnes of water, quite possibly straight to the ocean.
The cause is thought to be a deeply buried lake that suddenly over-topped.
Satellites were used to map the crater that developed as the 2.7km-thick overlying ice sheet slumped to fill the void left by the escaping water.
The peak discharge would have been more than double the normal flow rate of London's River Thames, researchers say.
The cause is thought to be a deeply buried lake that suddenly over-topped.
Satellites were used to map the crater that developed as the 2.7km-thick overlying ice sheet slumped to fill the void left by the escaping water.
The peak discharge would have been more than double the normal flow rate of London's River Thames, researchers say.
That's a lot of water.
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Antarctic flood produces 'ice crater' (subsurface lake draining into the sea) (Original Post)
NickB79
Jul 2013
OP
Deep13
(39,154 posts)1. uh-oh nt
Mnemosyne
(21,363 posts)2. A lot of water. Thanks, Nick. Guess we can only watch it all unfold now. nt
FirstLight
(13,364 posts)3. well that explains it
we recently saw news articles saying the jet stream/flow is shifting and causing the anomalies we are seeing in some places... i wonder if these two are related, wonder if the great oceanic currents will start shifting now...
nebenaube
(3,496 posts)4. hmmm...
Didn't somebody recently drill through into that lake?
pscot
(21,024 posts)5. The article says there are
about 400 of these lakes. They may drain and recharge periodically.
OnlinePoker
(5,725 posts)6. Rough calculations for perspective
6 Billion Tonnes is 6 trillion liters of (pure) water. There are 2.5 million liters in an Olympic sized swimming pool, so this makes a total of 2.4 million Olympic swimming pools. Lake Powell on the Colorado River currently has 3.8 trillion gallons of water in it (about 15 trillion liters), so this drained the equivalent of about 40% of Lake Powell's current reservoir.