<p><strong>An iceberg measuring nearly 50 square miles (130 square kilometers) floats away from the Petermann glacier in northwestern <a href="http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/map-machine#theme=Street&c=-42.6056|71.7069&sf=73874399.6427141">Greenland (map</a>) in a color-enhanced July 21 photograph snapped by <a href="http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/terra/index.html">NASA's Terra satellite</a>. </strong></p><p>Strong ocean currents—rather than, say, surface melting—likely caused the breakup, according to the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center.</p><p>Like many glaciers, <a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/08/080822-greenland-photo.html">Petermann glacier has been disintegrating (picture)</a> in recent years.</p><p>(Related: <a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/08/100806-ice-chunk-island-greenland-glacier-petermann-biggest-science/">"Ice Island Breaks off Greenland; Bigger Than Manhattan [2010]."</a>)</p><p><em>—Kastalia Medrano</em></p>
Heave Ho
An iceberg measuring nearly 50 square miles (130 square kilometers) floats away from the Petermann glacier in northwestern Greenland (map) in a color-enhanced July 21 photograph snapped by NASA's Terra satellite.
Strong ocean currents—rather than, say, surface melting—likely caused the breakup, according to the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center.
Like many glaciers, Petermann glacier has been disintegrating (picture) in recent years.
(Related: "Ice Island Breaks off Greenland; Bigger Than Manhattan [2010].")
—Kastalia Medrano
Space Pictures This Week: Extreme Free Fall, Ice Island, More
A daredevil free-falls from near the edge of space, an iceberg breaks free, and Great Lakes glimmer in this week's best space pictures.
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