I can also imagine an SMBC comic based on this idea.

At 20 km long and about half that wide, that iceberg would total about 200 km^2, significantly larger than Manhattan Islands 87.5km^2(per Wikipedia). Also remember, 9/10ths of an iceberg is below water. That 20 km long chunk is only the visible portion.

It’s a really big ice cube. Even Texas would have a problem putting that in a glass.

Gary 7

@19. vel : “I suspect that this satellite is the one that Faux Noise and friends have been baying about.”

Can you be a little more specific please? Which satellite?

In other news, the GRAIL has been lifted and is now Moon bound.

NASA GRAIL Mission to the Moon Under Way
Sat, 10 Sep 2011 10:51:58 PM UTC+0930

NASA’s GRAIL mission to study the moon from crust to core successfully lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Pad SLC-17B at 9:08 a.m. EDT. Mission controllers will await communication in approximately 90 minutes from the lunar duo indicating they have achieved proper orientation and deployed their solar arrays. “We are on our way, and early indications show everything is looking good,” said David Lehman, GRAIL project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif. “We will know more about GRAIL’s status in a few hours, after an opportunity to analyze telemetry and poll our mission controllers.”

Click on my name for source.

Sea ice is the general term for seawater than freezes over. It’s actually mostly freshwater by the time it freezes as most salt is shed in the freezing process.

@14. gdave : Yup. That sounds like the one. Thanks.

@4. Miek : “Dr. Plait, any comments on the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite?”

Which satellite would that be? Could you elaborate please?

I believe you are referring to Project Habakkuk, a British proposal during WWII. Although inspired by icebergs, it actually would have involved making an aircraft carrier out of a mix of wood pulp and ice (“pykrete”). A scale model ( a mere 1000 tons) may have been successfully floated in a Canadian lake (I’ve seen some sources claim it lasted for a whole summer afloat, but there seems to be some dispute about whether it was actually ever floated). “Mythbusters” also did a segment on it, and used their own, supposedly superior version of pykrete made out of frozen newspapers, which quickly melted.

But still, the idea appeals to me that somewhere, somehow, the Titanic is laughing.

The “somehow” I can’t answer for but the “somewhere” is pretty clear – the bottom of the Atlantic ocean a lot of fathoms down. The old wreck ain’t going anywhere.

@2. Tom : Brings back fond memories of a no doubt utterly obscure SF novel called Gallaghers Glacier by Walt & Leigh Richmond (Ace Books,1970.) starring a whole starship made out of ice.

I also think the British – or was it US – govt actually planned to build an aircraft carrier out of a huge iceberg at one stage maybe during WW II. Right?

Labrador *Hearts* *Bart Simpson* ???

Just kidding, but they really are doing a cruise. You can search it. Hopefully, they will have inspiration and sign on Phil as a speaker/guide!

The moon will be at last quarter on April 12, so the sky should be dark around 11:40 PM on April 14th, marking the exact 100th anniversary. The moon was new on the night of April 14-15 1912, so the sky stayed dark all night, even as the rescue ships finally arrived.