Talk:Iceberg

90% underwater

In the introduction it says 90% of an iceberg is underwater. I know this as an urban legend but is it really true? Can we have a source? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.13.72.28 (talk) 06:53, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

That is not an urban legend, but a simple fact comparable to saying the sky is blue on a clear day. Drop an ice cube in a glass of water to see for yourself the proportion of ice above and below the surface. If you want to mimic the salinity of sea water, stir in a couple of teaspoons of salt, and observe the difference. I have removed the "citation needed" tag from the lead section. Just plain Bill (talk) 14:46, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

That's imprecise. 90% seem to be too good to be true, it's something you teach children at school but by far not encyclopedic. As you pointed out yourself, salinity plays a role. That's an unstable value. The article currently says 91%. Where's the source for that? --88.65.127.73 (talk) 18:05, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

Of course it's imprecise; the question is imprecise. The figure varies with the density of the sea- or freshwater, its temperature, salinity, and so on, and the purity, gas content, mineral inclusions etc of the ice, and how many polar bears are hitching a ride or seals trying to lift it the ice from below. Not to mention wind and wave activity. Not every measurement of buoyancy takes place in a laboratory at STP with purified, standardised materials. Just plain Bill was quite correct to remove the tag. JonRichfield (talk) 05:21, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

How long to melt?

I was hoping to learn how long it takes for an Antarctic iceberg to melt. I read in an unreliable source 100s of years for the big flat-top types. -- GreenC 19:40, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

"ever since . . . 1912"

The article states, "icebergs have been considered a serious maritime hazard ever since the 1912 loss of the 'unsinkable' RMS Titanic." This implies (contrary to other information in the article) that before 1912, icebergs were not considered a serious maritime hazard.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Mt98765 (talk • contribs) 02:04, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

Reworded that bit, thanks for noting the problem. Vsmith (talk) 12:28, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

File:Iceberg in the Arctic with its underside exposed.jpg scheduled for POTD

Hello! This is to let editors know that the featured picture File:Iceberg in the Arctic with its underside exposed.jpg, which is used in this article, has been selected as the English Wikipedia's picture of the day (POTD) for November 6, 2020. A preview of the POTD is displayed below and can be edited at Template:POTD/2020-11-06. Any potential improvements or maintenance that could benefit the quality of this article should be made before its scheduled appearance on the Main Page. If you have any concerns, please place a message at Wikipedia talk:Picture of the day. Thank you! Cwmhiraeth (talk) 13:13, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

An iceberg is a large piece of freshwater ice that has broken off a glacier or an ice shelf and is floating freely in the open sea. Because the sea around this iceberg is so calm, the underwater portion is visible through the clear water. The largest iceberg ever detected was B-15, which split from the Ross Ice Shelf in Antarctica in 2000, and had a flat top; it had a surface area of 11,000 km² (4,200 sq mi) and broke into several pieces in 2002 and 2003. This picture depicts an irregularly shaped iceberg with a rounded top, calved from a glacier in the Arctic and photographed in the Arctic Ocean north of Svalbard.

Photograph credit: Andreas Weith

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2017 UAE towing project

Can't find any sources to say that this project was considered "unfeasible", or as the article previously had it, "failed". The ABC source is from 2019 and doesn't appear to give a clear fate beyond saying that not a single block has yet been harvested (which I assume from context goes for all projects planned since the 1950s). The $200m figure given in that article is also for a different project.

Has there been any update on either project in the five years since then? Belbury (talk) 17:13, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Jade Icebergs

I've recently uploaded a photo of a jade iceberg and was surprised to see they're not mentioned here. There's been a lot of academic interest in jade icebergs and it does seem like the sort of thing that could use a mention here. I'm happy to work on it a bit myself, but ice isn't entirely within my area of expertise. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 21:23, 8 April 2024 (UTC)