A colony of Adelie penguins living in Antarctica has suffered greatly after getting effectively landlocked by a giant iceberg, with about 150,000 of their population dying during the past six years, according to CNN.
The massive iceberg, dubbed B09B, is about 1,120 square miles, almost the size of Rome. Thus, when the iceberg ran aground into the colony's habitat of Cape Denison back in 2010, the penguins were ultimately forced to waddle across 40 miles of desolate land before finding food.
The effects of the iceberg have been devastating on the colony's population. With the distance from the colony to their food source radically increased, the mortality rate of the colony has soared, with only a fraction of the original 160,000 population still alive, reported The Express Tribune.
Due to their colony being landlocked, scientists believe that the future of the penguins remains dire. After all, unless the sea ice breaks up or the iceberg gets dislodged, there is little hope that the struggling colony would be given a reprieve.
If neither of those scenarios happens anytime soon, scientists believe that the entire population of the Cape Denison colony will be fully wiped out in 20 years, reports The Guardian.
Iceberg B09B had been floating close to the coast for about 20 years before crashing into a glacier and becoming stuck in 2010.
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