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Iceberg
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In March 2008, a chunk of Antarctic ice, about seven times the size of Manhattan, suddenly collapsed, putting an even greater portion of glacial ice at risk, and an ice shelf about the size of Connecticut was "hanging by a thread" as of March 25, 2008.
Technology history
Before April 1912 there was no system in place to track icebergs to guard ships against collisions. The sinking of the RMS Titanic, which caused the deaths of 1,523 of its 2,228 passengers, created the demand for a system to observe icebergs. For the remainder of the ice season of that year, the United States Navy patrolled the waters and monitored ice flow. In November 1913, the International Conference on the Safety of Life at Sea met in London to devise a more permanent system of observing icebergs. Within three months the participating maritime nations had formed the International Ice Patrol (IIP). The goal of the IIP was to collect data on meteorology and oceanography in order to measure currents, ice-flow, ocean temperature, and salinity levels. They published their first records in 1921, which allowed for a year-by-year comparison of iceberg movement.
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