150,000 Penguins Perish After Massive Iceberg Collides With Feeding Grounds

There is a truly shocking story out of Antartica after 150,000 Adelie penguins died after an iceberg the size of Rome converged with their traditional feeding grounds. The addition of the iceberg (B09B) required the penguins to make an 120km round trip to feed.

The penguins of Cape Denison in Commonwealth Bay were flourishing next to open water until the 2900 sq km iceberg entered the bay in 2010.  The result has been the steady decline of the population from 160,000 to just 10,000.  The colony will disappear entirely in 20 years unless the sea ice breaks up.

It is a breathtaking loss and shows the fragility of even large, long-standing populations.

Source: Guardian