Australia Warns Ships About Iceberg

Australian authorities today warned ships to watch out for the 54-square-mile iceberg that’s slowly approaching the continent’s southwest coast. The once-in-a-century iceberg broke off the coast of Antarctica roughly a decade ago and has been creeping toward the land down under ever since. It's still about 1,000 miles away, so "it’s not really on our doorstep yet,” one glaciologist tells the AFP. “But it’s been heading steadily towards us.”

It’s been more than 100 years since the area saw an iceberg of this size, but the glaciologist said they could become more common if global temperatures keep rising. Recently two other large icebergs were spotted further to the east, and 100 smaller chunks were spotted headed for New Zealand. (More Australia stories.)