The finger of death is a natural phenomenon in Arctic waters. It resembles an ice icicle, increasing in size and turning into a frozen stream as soon as the ice clot reaches the bottom. In the scientific community, the phenomenon is known as “brainicle”.

Characteristics of Brainicle

The finger of death in Antarctica can be seen in winter. The reason is the temperature difference between water and air. When the atmosphere cools to -18 degrees, the water temperature remains at -2 degrees.

Sea water rises from the subglacial layer upward, where it is cooled by frosty air, after which it sinks to the bottom and freezes warm streams of water encountered along the way. The cooled layer freezes and becomes covered with a crust of ice - salt is displaced from it. Then, under the formed ice layer, a layer of high-density salt water forms.

Next, the supercooled brine moves to the bottom, following the laws of physics. The water with which it comes into contact cools to -18-20 degrees, freezes and crystallizes. During the crystallization process, a fragile porous tube is formed - a finger.

Brainicles grow at a rate of 30 cm per hour. The process doesn't end when ice stalactites reach the bottom.

The cold jet has a density several times higher than that of the ocean waters surrounding it; it itself colder than ice. Inhabitants ocean depths, falling into her trap, they die.

The phenomenon had not previously been found in nature, so scientists different countries study it thoroughly.

First information

Oceanographer Silje Martin was the first to describe the icy finger of death in 1974. He compared it to hollow tubes, visually reminiscent of icicles, and shared assumptions about the mechanism of formation.

Later research group from Spain proposed her model for the formation of ice stalactites. Their story about the mass freeze starfish in a critically cold fluid stream impressed the Air Force. In 2011, the channel's film crew was the first to travel to Antarctica, where they were the first to film the icy finger of death.

Video plot

Submarine cameramen Doug Anderson and Hugh Miller set up video cameras near the volcanic Ross Island. The technique captured how 4 brynicles increased in size. The growth occurred so quickly that after 3.5 hours the ice stalactites touched the bottom.

The video of the finger of death showed a complete and objective picture of the natural phenomenon. He was named Brainicles from English words"brine" and "icicle", which literally translates as "icicle from ocean water" The term is used as a name for a salty, dense column of ocean water that is colder than ice.

The Air Force team's story shows how the pillar begins to move from the surface of the ocean to the bottom, turning everything that gets in its path, including living organisms, into ice. The spectacle is fantastic.

The source of life

Spanish scientists from the University of Granada are studying in detail the structure of brainicles, their chemical features. They are convinced that the underwater finger of death, killing sea ​​creatures, at the same time is the source of the origin of life.

This version is supported by the fact that membranes, chemical gradients, electrical potential and other conditions characteristic of ice stalactites are also found in natural environment. One such environment is hydrothermal vents. The structures found at the springs differ from the oceanic ones in that they grow upward.

A curious natural phenomenon occurring in the Arctic under-ice waters was filmed by a BBC film crew. Using time-lapse cameras, researchers recorded the appearance of an icicle underwater.

Yes, yes, exactly icicles under water. However, scientists who studied the mechanism and causes of this phenomenon gave it a more serious name - brynicle.

Brainicles occur under certain conditions temperature conditions and the first description of amazing underwater “stalactites” was made back in 1962 by the famous oceanographer Silje Martin.

How is brynicle formed?

in winter average temperature air above the surface sea ​​ice, and therefore the ice itself is below 20 degrees Celsius, but the temperature of the water itself averages -1.9 degrees. Interaction of water with colder air masses causes the formation of ice on the water surface, but there is one caveat: when the ice crust freezes and further grows, salt is displaced from the cooled layer of water and, as a result, a layer of saltier, and therefore denser, water is formed under the formed layer of ice.

Due to the fact that this layer of water supersaturated with salts comes into contact with ice, it is cooled to the temperature of ice, let me remind you that this is about minus 20 degrees Celsius. Further, according to the laws of physics, this supercooled brine begins its movement down to the bottom. The formation of the “ice finger” apparently begins with the so-called “growth center” - a characteristic irregularity on the lower surface of the ice crust. The flow of supercooled water moving to the bottom cools sea ​​water, which in turn freezes and crystallizes to form a fragile and porous “ice finger” tube.

When reaching the seabed, the flow of cold brine forms a kind of stream. Bottom animals (mostly echinoderms - starfish and urchins) that come across the path of the icy stream find themselves frozen alive. Filmed by underwater cameramen Hugh Miller and Doug Anderson, the Brainicle reached the bottom in three and a half hours. Filming of the formation and growth of Brynicle took place in Arctic waters near Little Razorback Island. This is the first video that gives a complete picture of the amazing natural phenomenon arising in the cold waters of the world's oceans.

Cinematographers Hugh Miller and Doug Anderson filmed during their presence in Antarctica amazing phenomenon- "". Above the surface of the ice in a shallow place, cameramen using the “time lens” method filmed for 12 hours the process of formation of ice stalactites, which reach the ocean floor in the form of a stream of extremely cold (below zero Celsius) and very salty water.

Ice finger of death video:

Scientists called this phenomenon, and the operators who observed it called it “the icy finger of death.”

The water of this jet has a much higher density than all the other ocean water surrounding it, and besides, the temperature of this jet is much lower than zero!

Ice Finger of Death or Brynicle

This " Icy Finger of Death"kills everything living it touches, turning everything into ice. This can be clearly seen in the extraordinary video provided by the BBC. This chilling stream of salt water, reaching the bottom, spreads and freezes everything in its path. All ocean animals (starfish and other ocean organisms) caught in this ice trap freeze and die.

The icy finger of death - an explanation of the phenomenon

One of the most curious phenomena that can be observed in winter under Antarctic ice– formation of ice stalactites. These hollow tubes of ice grow from the icy surface like icicles. But, despite some visual similarities, the formation mechanisms of ice stalactites and ordinary ice icicles are significantly different. For a long time this process remained poorly understood, mainly due to the difficulties of observing ice stalactites. Only in 2011, the process of forming one of them was filmed by a BBC film crew.

The process begins under the ice, where salty seawater freezes and salt that has no place in the ice's crystalline structure is released, further increasing the salinity of the water trapped in its voids—and lowering its freezing point.

If the ice cracks, this concentrated solution will flow downward because its density is higher than that of the surrounding sea water. And since its temperature can be below the freezing point of water, an ice “pipe” forms around it.

Near the volcanic Ross Island, where BBC underwater cameras were installed, operators were able to find and film 4 ice stalactites, which are created with very high speed and truly make the blood freeze in the veins of those who observe this phenomenon.
You can also see other wonders in Antarctica, for example,

Text: Ella Davies

When brine from sea ice flows down, ice "chandeliers" form bringing death to all living things on the seabed.

The BBC team managed to film unusual underwater ice stalactites that bring death to underwater inhabitants.

Using time-lapse cameras, the researchers captured how salty water, released from the freezing sea ice, flows down.

The temperature of this saline solution is noticeably below zero, so the surrounding seawater freezes upon contact with it, forming an ice shell.

Where the so-called “chandeliers” touch the seabed, a sheet of ice appears, chilling everything it touches with mortal cold, including starfish and urchins.

The unusual phenomenon was first captured by cameramen Hugh Miller and Doug Anderson for documentary film BBC "Frozen Planet".

creeping ice

This phenomenon is caused by the fact that the saline solution released when seawater freezes has a lower temperature and greater density than the surrounding seawater, and therefore sinks down. It forms “chandeliers”, in contact with more warm water under the ice.

To capture the formation of the unusual "stalactite", Hugh Miller set up time-lapse equipment under the ice near Ross Island, off the coast of Antarctica.

“While exploring the area around Little Razorback Island, we came across an area where there were already three or four chandeliers and another one was just starting to form,” Miller said.

Experts measured the temperature underwater and returned to the chosen location as soon as the same conditions arose there.

“It was a race against time because none of us knew how quickly these things formed,” Miller recalled. “The one we saw a week earlier was growing right before our eyes... The whole process only took five to six hours.”

Despite everything

The choice for shooting - under the ice, at the foot of the Erebus volcano, in water with a temperature of minus 2 degrees - was far from the easiest and most convenient.

“It was very difficult to get to the place where we filmed. It was quite far from the hole, and there wasn’t much space between the ice on the surface and the seabed, and we had to squeeze cameras and tripods in there,” Miller explained.

“We had to suffer. The equipment was very heavy because it had to sit motionless on the bottom for a long time.”

In addition to difficulties with installing equipment, operators also had to deal with interference underwater inhabitants. Large Weddell seals could not only break a “chandelier” with one easy movement, but also knock over heavy filming equipment.

“The first day I set up the camera, a seal knocked it over,” Miller laughs.

But the efforts of a team of researchers were ultimately crowned with success - for the first time they were able to film the process of formation of an ice stalactite.

Watch a fragment of the video at