Photo: Planet Today

The world's largest iceberg has broken in two, with a chunk of ice about the size of Queens and the Bronx combined splitting off from the main berg.

The mammoth A-68a berg first split from Antarctica's Larsen C ice shelf in 2017. The giant hunk of ice has been drifting ponderously northward ever since. From the water, A-68a would look a bit like a moving island, with cliffs rising up to 100 feet (30 m) above sea level. As recently as April, it measured 2,000 square miles (5,100 square kilometers), or about as big as three Houstons plus one Chicago. 

Recently, this floating ice-land has been on a collision course with South Georgia Island, a wildlife refuge in the South Atlantic Ocean that's home to millions of penguins, seals and other wildlife. 

It's not clear exactly why the iceberg fractured, but a crash into the shallow seabed several dozen miles from the South Georgia shoreline may have caused the split.

After A-68a's spectacular breakup, another iceberg, farther south in Antarctica's Weddell Sea, is now the world's largest at 1,500 square miles (4,000 square km), according to ESA. Its name is A-23a.

Source: Live Science