ZME Science
No Result
View All Result
ZME Science
No Result
View All Result
ZME Science

Home → Science → News

Antarctic ice shelf makes ghostly sounds as winds whip across its surface

It's like the soundscape for a bad horror movie.

Tibi PuiubyTibi Puiu
October 17, 2018
in Climate, News
A A
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterSubmit to Reddit
The Ross Ice Shelf at the Bay of Whales - the point where Amundsen staged his successful assault on the South Pole. Photo date 1998 December. Photographer: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS, ORA.
The Ross Ice Shelf at the Bay of Whales – the point where Amundsen staged his successful assault on the South Pole. Photo date 1998 December. Photographer: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS, ORA.

The barren and desolate Antarctic is an intimidating sight to behold. But as if that wasn’t enough, scientists found that when the wind blows across its surface, the ice shelf hums eerie soundscapes that would fit right in a B-movie horror flick. Strikingly, these creepy tunes actually have scientific value, enabling scientists to monitor warming in Antarctica’s variable ice.

The hum of Antarctica

Julien Chaput, a geophysicist and mathematician at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, deployed sensitive seismic sensors across the Ross Ice Shelf — Antarctica’s largest ice shelf, a huge Texas-sized plate of glacial ice — to study its physical properties. The sensors monitored the ice shelf’s vibrations and movements over a two-year period, from late 2014 to early 2017. But when the researchers actually analyzed the data, they came to a striking conclusion: the outermost layer of the ice shelf was almost constantly vibrating.

Ice shelves are covered in a thin blanket of snow, typically several meters deep, that insulates the ice below from warming and melting like a fur coat.

The seismic data show that as the wind whips across the snow dunes, this ‘fur coat’ rumbles like a colossal drum. The high frequency trapped seismic waves that ripple through the ice shelf were recorded by the researchers. This hum has a much too low frequency for human ears to hear, but you can listen to the sped-up version of the eerie sounds below.

“It’s kind of like you’re blowing a flute, constantly, on the ice shelf,” said Chaput in a statement.

And just like musicians change a flute’s pitch by altering which holes air is allowed to flow through or how fast it flows, weather conditions can change the frequency of the snow blanket’s vibrations.

“Either you change the velocity of the snow by heating or cooling it, or you change where you blow on the flute, by adding or destroying dunes,” Chaput said. “And that’s essentially the two forcing effects we can observe.”

The new study is important because it suggests seismic stations can be used to monitor the conditions of ice shelves in real-time. That’s because vibrations in the ice shelf’s insulating blanket could give scientists a sense of how the whole ice shelf is responding to climate conditions. For instance, changes in the hum could indicate the presence of melt ponds or cracks in the ice.

Such monitoring is already useful. After a warm spell in early 2016 when temperatures rose past freezing, the pitch of the low hum dropped, indicating snow and ice melt. But when temperatures dropped to their normal freezing levels, the corresponding drop in pitch did not reverse, indicating that permanent changes may have occurred in the blanket.

RelatedPosts

Warmer oceans lead to faster glacier melting
Is the snow turning red in Antarctica? Well, not exactly
Octopus with venom that works in freezing temperatures discovered
So one of Antarctica’s regions has lost thousands of billions of tons of ice

“The response of the ice shelf tells us that we can track extremely sensitive details about it,” Chaput said. “Basically, what we have on our hands is a tool to monitor the environment, really. And its impact on the ice shelf.”

The findings were reported in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. 

Tags: antarcticaice shelf

Share17TweetShare
Tibi Puiu

Tibi Puiu

Tibi is a science journalist and co-founder of ZME Science. He writes mainly about emerging tech, physics, climate, and space. In his spare time, Tibi likes to make weird music on his computer and groom felines. He has a B.Sc in mechanical engineering and an M.Sc in renewable energy systems.

Related Posts

Environment

Southern Ocean Salinity May Be Triggering Sea Ice Loss

byBill Morris
1 month ago
Climate

This Is the Oldest Ice on the Planet and It’s About to Be Slowly Melted to Unlock 1.5 Million Years of Climate History

byTibi Puiu
1 month ago
Animals

Pungent Penguin Poop Produces Polar Cloud Particles

byKimberly M. S. Cartier
4 months ago
Geology

Antarctica has a huge, completely hidden mountain range. New data reveals its birth over 500 million years ago

byJacqueline Halpin
4 months ago

Recent news

Venice’s Iconic Lion Is Actually a Repurposed Chinese Monster, Scientists Say

September 5, 2025

Researchers Transformed Sperm Cells into Tiny, Microbots That Could Deliver Drugs to Hard-to-Reach Places

September 5, 2025

Could AI and venom help us fight antibiotic resistance?

September 5, 2025
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Editorial Policy
  • Privacy Policy and Terms of Use
  • How we review products
  • Contact

© 2007-2025 ZME Science - Not exactly rocket science. All Rights Reserved.

No Result
View All Result
  • Science News
  • Environment
  • Health
  • Space
  • Future
  • Features
    • Natural Sciences
    • Physics
      • Matter and Energy
      • Quantum Mechanics
      • Thermodynamics
    • Chemistry
      • Periodic Table
      • Applied Chemistry
      • Materials
      • Physical Chemistry
    • Biology
      • Anatomy
      • Biochemistry
      • Ecology
      • Genetics
      • Microbiology
      • Plants and Fungi
    • Geology and Paleontology
      • Planet Earth
      • Earth Dynamics
      • Rocks and Minerals
      • Volcanoes
      • Dinosaurs
      • Fossils
    • Animals
      • Mammals
      • Birds
      • Fish
      • Amphibians
      • Reptiles
      • Invertebrates
      • Pets
      • Conservation
      • Animal facts
    • Climate and Weather
      • Climate change
      • Weather and atmosphere
    • Health
      • Drugs
      • Diseases and Conditions
      • Human Body
      • Mind and Brain
      • Food and Nutrition
      • Wellness
    • History and Humanities
      • Anthropology
      • Archaeology
      • History
      • Economics
      • People
      • Sociology
    • Space & Astronomy
      • The Solar System
      • Sun
      • The Moon
      • Planets
      • Asteroids, meteors & comets
      • Astronomy
      • Astrophysics
      • Cosmology
      • Exoplanets & Alien Life
      • Spaceflight and Exploration
    • Technology
      • Computer Science & IT
      • Engineering
      • Inventions
      • Sustainability
      • Renewable Energy
      • Green Living
    • Culture
    • Resources
  • Videos
  • Reviews
  • About Us
    • About
    • The Team
    • Advertise
    • Contribute
    • Editorial policy
    • Privacy Policy
    • Contact

© 2007-2025 ZME Science - Not exactly rocket science. All Rights Reserved.