But scientists working in Antarctica currently are also discovering the incredible contributions that icebergs make to ocean life.

Prof Griffiths and Prof Johnston are working on the Sir David Attenborough ship collecting evidence of what their team believe is a huge flow of nutrients from ice in Antarctica across Earth.

Particles and nutrients from around the world get trapped into the ice, which is then slowly released into the ocean, the scientists explain.

“Without ice, we wouldn’t have these ecosystems. They are some of the most productive in the world, and support huge numbers of species and individual animals, and feed the biggest animals in the world like the blue whale,” says Prof Griffiths.

A sign that this nutrient release has started around A23a will be when vast phytoplankton blooms blossom around the iceberg. It would look like a vast green halo around the ice, visible from satellite pictures over the next weeks and months.

The life cycle of icebergs is a natural process, but climate change is expected to create more icebergs as Antarctica warms and becomes more unstable.

More could break away from the continent’s vast ice sheets and melt at quicker rates, disrupting patterns of wildlife and fishing in the region.