ice shelf

American

noun

an ice sheet projecting into coastal waters so that the end floats.

ice shelf British

noun

a thick mass of ice that is permanently attached to the land but projects into and floats on the sea

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of ice shelf

First recorded in 1910–15

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

See Examples For:

ice shelf

Scientists discovered that the shape of the underside of the ice shelf strongly affects how seawater circulates below it.

From Science Daily ● May 10, 2026

The case began way back in 2002 with the extraordinary collapse of an ice shelf called Larsen B in the eastern Antarctic Peninsula.

From BBC ● Nov. 3, 2025

But the bay vacated by the ice shelf was eventually filled with sea-ice "fastened" to the seabed, helping to partly stabilise Hektoria.

From BBC ● Nov. 3, 2025

She said the satellites and aerial surveys that created Bedmap3 will allow researchers to better estimate how thick the ice is, particularly in transient zones where the grounded ice changes to a floating ice shelf.

From Salon ● Apr. 5, 2025

We had traveled five miles on the ice shelf above the foaming sea.

From North-Pole Voyages by Mudge, Zachariah Atwell

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023