Editing Cryosphere Dynamics (section)

=== Ice Shelves and Marine-Terminating Glaciers ===
In Antarctica and Greenland, massive rivers of ice flow outward from the interior and meet the ocean, forming '''ice shelves'''—thick slabs of ice that float on the sea surface but remain attached to the grounded land ice behind them. These floating shelves act like massive buttresses or physical corks, holding back the flow of the land ice. If warm ocean water erodes an ice shelf from below, causing it to collapse, the grounded glaciers behind it often rapidly accelerate their flow into the ocean.