How Big Is a Manhattan-Sized Iceberg?

Heather Goldstone is the science editor at WCAI, the Cape and Islands NPR Station. She holds a Ph.D. in ocean science from M.I.T. and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and spent a decade as an active researcher before leaving the lab to become a writer.

July 19, 2012

Updated July 03, 2023

Yesterday, while everyone else was oohing and aahing over a newly calved iceberg twice the size of Manhattan and pondering its significance in terms of climate change and sea level rise, I was stuck on the "Manhattan" part. Couldn't we come up with some better size comparison? Call me a country-bumpkin, but I certainly don't have an intuitive sense of how big Manhattan is. Grist's Chris Mims seemed to read my mind and broadcast it on Twitter.

Chris may have been kidding, but I wasn't. What ensued was a brief conversation about the impossibility of finding a universally recognizable size comparison, and the need for better storytelling in science journalism. You can read it all on Storify.
But I'm curious: do you know how big Manhattan is?