Canadian Ice Service Tracking Icebergs in Western Arctic for 1st Time

The Canadian Ice Service is tracking icebergs to monitor and predict drifting patterns in the western Arctic for the first time, according to CBC Canada. Last week, a branch of Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) dropped beacons from a Hercules aircraft onto icebergs in the Beaufort Sea. 

Adrienne White, an ice analyst with the Canadian Ice Service, said that while it's common practice to track icebergs in the eastern Arctic, they have never before deployed sensors in this area. 

The icebergs being monitored are castaways from the Milne ice shelf on the northwest coast of Ellesmere Island — an area that was historically permanently covered in ice. Over the past century Ellesmere Island has begun to break up, explained White, and that process has accelerated within the last decade.