Wilkins Ice Shelf still vanishing

PARIS, June 17 (UPI) -- The European Space Agency says the Antarctic's Wilkins Ice Shelf continued to break-up with a 100-mile area breaking away at the end of May.

The ice shelf event May 30-May 31 is the first documented episode to occur during the Antarctic winter, the ESA said.

Wilkins Ice Shelf, a broad plate of floating ice south of South America on the Antarctic Peninsula, is connected to two islands, Charcot and Latady. In February, an area of about 250 miles broke free of the ice shelf, narrowing the connection to a four-mile strip. The latest event reduced that strip to just 1.6 miles.

The ESA's Envisat satellite observes the rapidly dwindling strip of ice that is protecting thousands of miles of the ice shelf from further destruction.

Matthias Braun of Bonn University's Center for Remote Sensing of Land Surfaces and Angelika Humbert from the Institute of Geophysics at Munster University said the remaining plate has an arched fracture at its narrowest point, making it very likely the connection will soon completely break.

The ESA said Antarctic ice shelves are important indicators of climate change because they are sandwiched by extraordinarily rising surface air temperatures and a warming ocean.