A new paper that examines the role of the ‘footloose’ calving mechanism in ice islands was just published in the Journal of Glaciology.   Jesse Smith, compared observed ice island calving events from the Canadian Ice Island Drift, Deterioration and Detection (CI2D3) Database with predictions from a finite element model created by Mahmud Sazidy.  Simulated rams (underwater protrusions) on one side of the ice island matched the real-world behaviour of ice island calving and the study went on to study the relationship between ram length and extent and stress build-up in the ice islands that could lead to fracture.