The Markham Ice Shelf was one of five major ice shelves in Canada, all on the north coast of Ellesmere Island, Nunavut. The ice shelf broke off from the coast in early August 2008, becoming adrift in the Arctic Ocean. The 4,500 year old ice shelf was then 19 square miles (49 km2) in size, nearly the size of Manhattan, and approximately ten stories tall. On September 3, 2008, CNN quoted Derek Mueller, of Trent University in Ontario, Canada as saying to the Associated Press:
"The Markham Ice Shelf was a big surprise because it suddenly disappeared. We went under cloud for a bit during our research and when the weather cleared up, all of a sudden there was no more ice shelf. It was a shocking event that underscores the rapidity of changes taking place in the Arctic... The Markham Ice Shelf had half the biomass for the entire Canadian Arctic Ice Shelf ecosystem as a habitat for cold tolerant microbial life; algae that sit on top of the ice shelf and photosynthesize like plants would. Now that it's disappeared, we're looking at ecosystems on the verge of extinction.As of September 6, it was floating in the Arctic Ocean.
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Famous quotes containing the words markham, ice and/or shelf:
“Who loosened and let down this brutal jaw?”
—Edwin Markham (1852–1940)
“...there was the annual Fourth of July picketing at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. ...I thought it was ridiculous to have to go there in a skirt. But I did it anyway because it was something that might possibly have an effect. I remember walking around in my little white blouse and skirt and tourists standing there eating their ice cream cones and watching us like the zoo had opened.”
—Martha Shelley, U.S. author and social activist. As quoted in Making History, part 3, by Eric Marcus (1992)
“The boy seemed to have fallen
From shelf to shelf of someone’s rage.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)