This story is one that demonstrates yet again that science is as much about creativity as it is about careful work and following the scientific method.

A new paper in Nature Geoscience points out that underwater landslides can be caused when massive icebergs run aground or otherwise hit or scrape outcrops in the seafloor. There are other triggers as well, but in this new era of melting sea ice and fragmenting ice shelves, this new piece of knowledge points to a potentially hazardous future.

At the extreme end, undersea landslides can cause large volumes of water to suddenly become displaced and send a massive tsunami through the sea. While less extreme, these events can also destroy rare and sensitive ecosystems and damage undersea cables. 

This discovery was made almost by accident. Researcher Alex Normandeau was on a research trip through Bouffin Islands Southwind Fjord and snapped a bunch of photos of a random iceberg. The trip was actually to look for landslides, and while none were observed during the trip, it was noted on a return trip that one had occurred shortly after that initial voyage, and it was located near features that looked like the scrapping of an iceberg running aground. Using satellite data from Sentinel-2, the research team realized that the original, random iceberg was the trigger of that new landslide.

And now, every iceberg, we realize, is a danger to both the things on, in, and above the water. The more you know?

More Information

An Iceberg May Have Initiated a Submarine Landslide (Eos)

“Submarine landslides triggered by iceberg collision with the seafloor,” Alexandre Normandeau et al., 2021 June 24, Nature Geoscience