Picture of the day w/ bonus animation

via Wired Science and the European Space Agency’s Envisat satellite comes this look at the icy demolition derby that happened in February between the 60 mile long B-9B iceberg (named after famed Icelandic explorer Horst B-9B Jr.) as it crashed into a protruding area of the Mertz glacier.

The result? A glacier that doesn't protrude quite so much any more and a new 50-mile-by-25-mile iceberg creatively named C-28. Because it floats in the "C" and is the 28th glacier to break off from the quadrant of Antarctica nearest to the criminal prison island of Australia.

In other news, science does have an explanation for this kind of repeated large scale event, but a energy lobby claims this glacier just did it for the money and an invite to Al Gore's Oscar party. So I guess there's no definitive answer as long as this debate rages.

Picture of the day

Via the Guardian comes this look at some of the winners in the World Press Photo Awards 2010.

World press photo of the year: by Italian photographer Pietro Masturzo, showing women shouting on a rooftop in protest at the presidential election results in Tehran

Spot news: third prize stories AFP photographer Palestinian Mohammed Abed came third in this category with his pictures of the shelling in Gaza

Spot news: second prize stories AFP photographer Olivier Laban-Mattei took a second place with his images of post-election protests in Tehran

Nature: first prize stories Canadian photographer Paul Nicklen, National Geographic, won first prize in this category for South Georgia, Antarctica

People in the news: second prize singles The runner-up in this category was American photographer David Guttenfelder for Associated Press, who showed US soldiers responding to Taliban fire outside their bunker in Korengal valley

Picture of the day

Via New Scientist and the book/exhibition The Heart of the Great Alone comes the photographs of Herbert Ponting and Frank Hurley, who documented Robert Scott's ill-fated Terra Nova expedition and Ernest Shackleton's slightly more successful Nimrod expedition in the early 1900's.