Table of Contents
Another beloved animated film has undergone the live-action treatment, but this time, we’re pleased to say it’s a gem. The tale of a boy and his adorably misunderstood beast, How to Train Your Dragon has dominated theaters this summer. Although it hasn’t exactly reinvented the wheel, “the film manages to recreate the magic of the original through impeccable visual effects, faithful cinematography, and intricate production design.”
Dean DeBlois is back in the writer and director’s chair, and Gerard Butler reprises the role he voiced in the animated films as Viking chief Stoick the Vast. Meanwhile, Mason Thames stars as Hiccup, his awkward son.
While it’s still floating around in theaters, the movie is officially streaming on digital on-demand streaming services (Prime Video, Apple TV, etc.) as of July 15, with a streaming debut on Peacock to come… eventually. Here’s everything you need to know about how to watch How to Train Your Dragon (2025) at home.
Is How to Train Your Dragon worth watching?
Unlike Disney’s Snow White or The Little Mermaid, the live-action remake of How to Train Your Dragon actually manages to recapture what made the original film so delightful. Critics and audiences alike loved it, giving it a 77 and 97 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes. It earned $239 million domestically and $561 million worldwide, surpassing the original film’s box office numbers.
Mashable’s own reviewer raved about the visual effects, faithful adaptation, and strong performances. “Essentially, Toothless is magnificent in live-action. Every scale glimmers, every muscle moves, and the franchise’s beloved dragon’s signature expressiveness shines through every scene. Supported by a heartfelt performance from Thames, who is essentially working with a puppet, the Hiccup-Toothless friendship of all friendships is lovingly rendered,” writes Mashable’s Shannon Connellan.
Read our full review of How to Train Your Dragon.
How to watch How to Train Your Dragon at home
Credit: Universal Pictures
It’s time for audiences to revisit the Isle of Berk from their couches. There are a couple of different ways you can watch. You can buy it or rent it on digital for as low as $19.99, or you can wait for its future debut on Peacock to stream it. See the details below.
Buy or rent it on digital
The film is available now to buy for $29.99 or rent for $19.99. While saving a few bucks and opting for the rental option is tempting, just be aware that you’ll only get 30 days to watch the film and just 48 hours to finish it once you start. If you choose to buy it instead, then it’s yours to keep.
Here are some quick links to rent or purchase How to Train Your Dragon:
Stream it on Peacock
As a Universal Pictures film, we know that How to Train Your Dragon will eventually make its streaming debut on Peacock, the NBCUniversal-owned streaming service. While we don’t know the exact date yet, we expect it to make its Peacock debut in late September or October 2025. We’ll keep you updated.
Don’t have a Peacock subscription? You can sign up for as low as $7.99 per month with ads or $13.99 per month without to prepare for live-action Toothless’ streaming debut. But before you get ahead of yourself, be sure to check out the best ways to save some money on a subscription below.
The best Peacock streaming deals
Best Peacock deal: Save 17% on an annual subscription
The best Peacock deal on any given day is the annual subscription deal. You’ll get 12 months of streaming for the price of 10 if you pay for a year upfront. An annual Peacock subscription costs just $79.99 per year with ads (which breaks down to about $6.67 per month) or $139.99 per year without ads (which breaks down to about $11.67 per month). That’s about 17% in total savings compared to paying monthly.
Best Peacock deal for Xfinity customers: free Peacock Premium for eligible accounts
Are you an Xfinity customer? Be sure to check the eligibility details below, as you might be able to score a Peacock Premium subscription for free. Here’s a breakdown of who is eligible for the deal or you can head to Xfinity.com for more details.
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Xfinity Internet customers who are Diamond or Platinum Xfinity Rewards members can get Peacock Premium for free by redeeming a reward for it. Sign in at xfinity.com/rewards and choose Peacock as a reward. Then, wait for your email (it may take a few hours) with instructions on activating the offer.
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NOW TV customers can also receive Peacock Premium as part of their service.
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New customers with Xfinity Internet and an X1 TV Box, Flex streaming TV Box, or a Xumo Stream Box from Xfinity can get Peacock Premium for free for six months.
Best Peacock deal for students: Save $5/month for one year
Students can sign up for a full year of Peacock Premium at a discounted rate of $2.99 per month instead of $7.99. That’s a total of just $35.88 for the year. Just verify your student status via SheerID and retrieve the unique promo code to unlock the savings. Just note that it can only be used once, and after the promo year is up, you’ll be charged full price again.
Mashable Deals
Best Peacock deal for first responders: Save $4/month
First responders and medical professionals can secure a Peacock Premium subscription at a discounted rate of $3.99 per month. Just verify your first responder or medical professional status via SheerID, and you’ll get a unique promo code that will drop the cost of a subscription by $4 per month. If you continue to meet verification qualifications, you can renew the deal each year — although you may have to go through the verification process each time and receive a new promo code. Learn more about eligibility terms and requirements.
Best for active military and veterans: Save $4/month
Active duty U.S. military service members, Reservists, National Guard members, veterans, or U.S. military retirees can score a Peacock Premium subscription for a discounted rate of $3.99 per month instead of the usual $7.99 per month, so long as you can prove your military status using SheerID. Retrieve the promotional code to activate the offer. Eligible military personnel who continue to meet requirements can redeem the deal annually.
Best for teachers: Save $4/month for one year
For one year, educators who can verify their status on SheerID can get Peacock Premium for just $3.99 per month instead of $7.99. Once the promotional period ends, you’ll be charged full price. Be sure to cancel before the year ends.
Best for Instacart users: free Peacock Premium for Instacart+ subscribers
By signing up for Instacart+ for $99.99 per year, you’ll unlock a free Peacock Premium subscription. That’s on top of free grocery delivery, lower fees, and credit back on eligible pickup orders. That’s a $79.99 per year value tacked on to your Instacart+ subscription for free. Oh and here’s a pro tip: if you’re new to Instacart+, you’ll get a free two-week trial to test the waters. If you wait until the streaming release of How to Train Your Dragon, you could even watch it for free during the trial period.
Best for JetBlue members: free Peacock Premium for one year for Mosaic status members
If you’re a JetBlue TrueBlue Mosaic status member, you can get your first year of Peacock Premium for free if you sign up before July 31 (a $79.99 value). If you don’t have Mosaic status, you can earn 1,000 free TrueBlue points when you sign up for Peacock. Learn more about eligibility and terms over on Peacock’s special offer page.
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#watch #liveaction #Train #Dragon #home
![xAI fired an engineer who raised alarms about Grok safety, new lawsuit claims | TechCrunch
A former engineer at Elon Musk’s xAI has filed suit against the company and its parent SpaceX claiming he was fired for raising concerns about AI safety.
Devin Kim, who left xAI in September 2025, filed the suit in a California state court on Tuesday. The complaint comes days before SpaceX is set to join the public markets in what’s shaping up to be the largest IPO in history.
According to the lawsuit, which TechCrunch has viewed, Kim became a prominent voice for AI safety while working on Grok, xAI’s AI chatbot. He allegedly complained repeatedly about xAI’s failure to prioritize safety in Grok’s development, a product that has since come under fire for a range of safety and behavioral issues. In particular, Kim was concerned with the possibility that Grok could foment discrimination and help spread information about weapons of mass destruction.
“Grok, of course, proved Mr. Kim right by engaging in spectacular displays of online hatred and vitriol, with the model likening itself to Hitler (‘MechaHitler’),” the lawsuit reads. “Following the Hitler debacle, Mr. Kim worked to re-evaluate Grok’s political bias and discriminatory tendencies.”
September was my last month at xAI! I joined as one of the first members of the post-training team in 2024 and eventually led research tooling, where we built some of the world’s best systems to accelerate Grok’s development.On my first day, I was at the whiteboard with @ibab…— Devin Kim (@devindkim) October 3, 2025
A few months after Kim departed xAI, Grok made headlines again when the chatbot was used to flood X — Musk’s social media platform that also falls under the xAI umbrella — with nonconsensual sexual imagery.
The lawsuit also positions Kim as a whistleblower who was concerned about xAI’s alleged disregard for AI safety as “unlawful” in areas such as internet regulation, consumer protection and unfair business practices, and arms and explosives regulation, among others.
xAI and SpaceX did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Kim’s focus on AI safety predates his time at xAI. While working at Scale AI, Kim worked on early safety AI initiatives, like leading a project that produced training data for AI to train systems to detect harmful content and comply with governance policies. Last week, the nonprofit Center for AI Safety, which focuses on AI risks, named Kim as its president.
Interestingly, the lawsuit doesn’t implicate Musk himself as a reason for a lack of safety. Rather, Kim’s lawyers describe Musk as having directed xAI to follow the law and implement appropriate safety and testing processes. Instead the claim targets Kim’s supervisor, xAI co-founder Jimmy Ba — who left the company earlier this year — saying that Ba ignored Musk’s directives and retaliated against Kim for pushing for safeguards, in an effort to “silence his repeated complaints about AI safety and biases.”
The lawsuit portrays Ba as someone who vehemently opposed AI safety measures, allegedly telling Kim at one point “AI will kill us all anyway,” and who was instead driven by a mission to make xAI the first to reach superintelligence.
“In one instance in or around August 2025, Mr. Ba attempted to thwart EU safety regulations during the release of Grok Code 1, misrepresenting aspects of the model in order to avoid legally required testing,” the complaint says. “Mr. Ba indicated that he would rather release an unsafe model than a poor-performing one. Mr. Musk ultimately had to intervene.”
According to the lawsuit, Kim intended to give a presentation of his findings the week of September 15, 2025, but Ba called him into a meeting and told him they should “go [their] separate ways” without providing a satisfactory reason.
TechCrunch has reached out to Ba for comment.
Kim is seeking compensatory and punitive damages, as well as a declaratory judgment that xAI and SpaceX’s conduct was unlawful.
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.#xAI #fired #engineer #raised #alarms #Grok #safety #lawsuit #claims #TechCrunchai safety,devin kim,Grok,SpaceX,xAI](https://i3.wp.com/techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/grok-getty.jpg?resize=1200%2C800&ssl=1 "xAI fired an engineer who raised alarms about Grok safety, new lawsuit claims | TechCrunch
A former engineer at Elon Musk’s xAI has filed suit against the company and its parent SpaceX claiming he was fired for raising concerns about AI safety.
Devin Kim, who left xAI in September 2025, filed the suit in a California state court on Tuesday. The complaint comes days before SpaceX is set to join the public markets in what’s shaping up to be the largest IPO in history.
According to the lawsuit, which TechCrunch has viewed, Kim became a prominent voice for AI safety while working on Grok, xAI’s AI chatbot. He allegedly complained repeatedly about xAI’s failure to prioritize safety in Grok’s development, a product that has since come under fire for a range of safety and behavioral issues. In particular, Kim was concerned with the possibility that Grok could foment discrimination and help spread information about weapons of mass destruction.
“Grok, of course, proved Mr. Kim right by engaging in spectacular displays of online hatred and vitriol, with the model likening itself to Hitler (‘MechaHitler’),” the lawsuit reads. “Following the Hitler debacle, Mr. Kim worked to re-evaluate Grok’s political bias and discriminatory tendencies.”
September was my last month at xAI! I joined as one of the first members of the post-training team in 2024 and eventually led research tooling, where we built some of the world’s best systems to accelerate Grok’s development.On my first day, I was at the whiteboard with @ibab…— Devin Kim (@devindkim) October 3, 2025
A few months after Kim departed xAI, Grok made headlines again when the chatbot was used to flood X — Musk’s social media platform that also falls under the xAI umbrella — with nonconsensual sexual imagery.
The lawsuit also positions Kim as a whistleblower who was concerned about xAI’s alleged disregard for AI safety as “unlawful” in areas such as internet regulation, consumer protection and unfair business practices, and arms and explosives regulation, among others.
xAI and SpaceX did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Kim’s focus on AI safety predates his time at xAI. While working at Scale AI, Kim worked on early safety AI initiatives, like leading a project that produced training data for AI to train systems to detect harmful content and comply with governance policies. Last week, the nonprofit Center for AI Safety, which focuses on AI risks, named Kim as its president.
Interestingly, the lawsuit doesn’t implicate Musk himself as a reason for a lack of safety. Rather, Kim’s lawyers describe Musk as having directed xAI to follow the law and implement appropriate safety and testing processes. Instead the claim targets Kim’s supervisor, xAI co-founder Jimmy Ba — who left the company earlier this year — saying that Ba ignored Musk’s directives and retaliated against Kim for pushing for safeguards, in an effort to “silence his repeated complaints about AI safety and biases.”
The lawsuit portrays Ba as someone who vehemently opposed AI safety measures, allegedly telling Kim at one point “AI will kill us all anyway,” and who was instead driven by a mission to make xAI the first to reach superintelligence.
“In one instance in or around August 2025, Mr. Ba attempted to thwart EU safety regulations during the release of Grok Code 1, misrepresenting aspects of the model in order to avoid legally required testing,” the complaint says. “Mr. Ba indicated that he would rather release an unsafe model than a poor-performing one. Mr. Musk ultimately had to intervene.”
According to the lawsuit, Kim intended to give a presentation of his findings the week of September 15, 2025, but Ba called him into a meeting and told him they should “go [their] separate ways” without providing a satisfactory reason.
TechCrunch has reached out to Ba for comment.
Kim is seeking compensatory and punitive damages, as well as a declaratory judgment that xAI and SpaceX’s conduct was unlawful.
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.#xAI #fired #engineer #raised #alarms #Grok #safety #lawsuit #claims #TechCrunchai safety,devin kim,Grok,SpaceX,xAI")
![Scientists Found a Continent-Sized Geological Structure Hiding Beneath Antarctica
The East Antarctic Ice Sheet is almost unfathomably huge. Covering about 75% of the entire frigid continent (nearly everything on its side of the Transantarctic Mountains), the sheet covers about 3.9 million square miles (10.2 million square kilometers) and extends down 1.4 miles (2.2 km), on average, before coming into contact with Earth’s surface. At its deepest, the ice plunges down over 3 miles (4.9 km). For decades, scientists assumed that this literally continent-sized block of ice rested on an expansive and stable chunk of Earth’s crust known as a craton. A team of researchers has now complicated that picture—mapping a vast, interconnected geological structure that fans out from a troubling “tectonic deformation.” Beneath this ice sheet, thinner and more geologically recent slices of crusty lithosphere fan out into hidden valleys called “pull-apart basins.” These basins—30 elongated wedge-shaped valleys in total—constitute an entirely new, continental-scale geological region underneath Antarctica, in fact, one which the researchers have named the East Antarctic Fan-Shaped Basin Province (EAFBP). But it’s how they likely formed that has now caught researchers’ attention.
To put it bluntly, it turns out that about 90% of the planet’s fresh water ice may not be on solid ground. Geologist John Goodge called the team’s findings “provocative” in an independent commentary on the new study, published Thursday in the journal Nature Geoscience.
“East Antarctica is typically considered from seismic tomography and geodetics to be ancient and generally stable,” according to Goodge, who studies continental tectonics with the nonprofit Planetary Science Institute. “[But] something else is going on at depth.” Continental divides Goodge speculates that this seemingly “coherent pull-apart system,” as presented in the new study, might help explain a variety of mysterious heat and water flows beneath this ice sheet’s surface, like that enormous subglacial lake identified in 2016 or some of the hundreds more like it.
The study’s authors, led by geophysicist Egidio Armadillo at the University of Genoa in Italy, agreed: “Because these basins underlie about half of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet, they are likely to heavily influence both ice-flow and landscape evolution,” the researchers wrote in their study, also published Thursday in Nature Geoscience. Armadillo’s team, coordinating across Europe and the U.K., developed their new understanding of Antarctica’s hidden bedrock via an exhaustive set of sensory data. Gravitational and magnetic anomalies were mapped via low-altitude airborne surveys. Ground surface features were mapped with seismic tools, using sound waves that vibrate through the ice and ping back information about subglacial landscapes in 3D. The grey, magenta, and cyan lines represent the apparent new fault lines discovered. Credit: Nature Geoscience All of this data—the fruits of “multi-national efforts to image within and below the ice sheet,” as Goodge put it—had already revealed that regions of the continent were “undergoing more rapid movement and ice-mass loss than previously recognized.” Armadillo’s team merely helped to explain why.
The mechanism Armadillo and his colleagues proposed for the formation of these fan-shaped basins is called “distributed rotational extension.” It involves points called Euler poles around which tectonic plates pivot or rotate rather than smash into each other or pull apart. The result is a bit like decks of cards being spread out on a table, thinning out the stack of Earth’s crust as it moves. An icy situation Goodge took pains to spell out the basins’ implications for melting Antarctic ice due to climate change and the risk of rising global sea levels.
The mere existence of these basins, he wrote, “could introduce widespread, systemic instability to the East Antarctic Ice Sheet” via thinner layers of Earth’s crust and more heat flow from below. On top of that, a series of fault-line “troughs” documented between the basins appear “tailor-made to promote outward flow of ice streams from the interior” into the world’s oceans, he said. That said, the team’s findings are unlikely to end this debate. As Goodge noted, Antarctica is “the last continental frontier of scientific exploration.” It’s still a very mysterious place, one that’s challenging to study given its inhospitable temperatures and extreme geography. Its “cryptic subglacial geology” might stay that way for a while. #Scientists #ContinentSized #Geological #Structure #Hiding #Beneath #AntarcticaAntarctica,Geology,mapping,Plate tectonics](https://gizmodo.com/app/uploads/2026/06/East-Antarctic-Fan-shaped-Basin-Province.jpeg "Scientists Found a Continent-Sized Geological Structure Hiding Beneath Antarctica
The East Antarctic Ice Sheet is almost unfathomably huge. Covering about 75% of the entire frigid continent (nearly everything on its side of the Transantarctic Mountains), the sheet covers about 3.9 million square miles (10.2 million square kilometers) and extends down 1.4 miles (2.2 km), on average, before coming into contact with Earth’s surface. At its deepest, the ice plunges down over 3 miles (4.9 km). For decades, scientists assumed that this literally continent-sized block of ice rested on an expansive and stable chunk of Earth’s crust known as a craton. A team of researchers has now complicated that picture—mapping a vast, interconnected geological structure that fans out from a troubling “tectonic deformation.” Beneath this ice sheet, thinner and more geologically recent slices of crusty lithosphere fan out into hidden valleys called “pull-apart basins.” These basins—30 elongated wedge-shaped valleys in total—constitute an entirely new, continental-scale geological region underneath Antarctica, in fact, one which the researchers have named the East Antarctic Fan-Shaped Basin Province (EAFBP). But it’s how they likely formed that has now caught researchers’ attention.
To put it bluntly, it turns out that about 90% of the planet’s fresh water ice may not be on solid ground. Geologist John Goodge called the team’s findings “provocative” in an independent commentary on the new study, published Thursday in the journal Nature Geoscience.
“East Antarctica is typically considered from seismic tomography and geodetics to be ancient and generally stable,” according to Goodge, who studies continental tectonics with the nonprofit Planetary Science Institute. “[But] something else is going on at depth.” Continental divides Goodge speculates that this seemingly “coherent pull-apart system,” as presented in the new study, might help explain a variety of mysterious heat and water flows beneath this ice sheet’s surface, like that enormous subglacial lake identified in 2016 or some of the hundreds more like it.
The study’s authors, led by geophysicist Egidio Armadillo at the University of Genoa in Italy, agreed: “Because these basins underlie about half of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet, they are likely to heavily influence both ice-flow and landscape evolution,” the researchers wrote in their study, also published Thursday in Nature Geoscience. Armadillo’s team, coordinating across Europe and the U.K., developed their new understanding of Antarctica’s hidden bedrock via an exhaustive set of sensory data. Gravitational and magnetic anomalies were mapped via low-altitude airborne surveys. Ground surface features were mapped with seismic tools, using sound waves that vibrate through the ice and ping back information about subglacial landscapes in 3D. The grey, magenta, and cyan lines represent the apparent new fault lines discovered. Credit: Nature Geoscience All of this data—the fruits of “multi-national efforts to image within and below the ice sheet,” as Goodge put it—had already revealed that regions of the continent were “undergoing more rapid movement and ice-mass loss than previously recognized.” Armadillo’s team merely helped to explain why.
The mechanism Armadillo and his colleagues proposed for the formation of these fan-shaped basins is called “distributed rotational extension.” It involves points called Euler poles around which tectonic plates pivot or rotate rather than smash into each other or pull apart. The result is a bit like decks of cards being spread out on a table, thinning out the stack of Earth’s crust as it moves. An icy situation Goodge took pains to spell out the basins’ implications for melting Antarctic ice due to climate change and the risk of rising global sea levels.
The mere existence of these basins, he wrote, “could introduce widespread, systemic instability to the East Antarctic Ice Sheet” via thinner layers of Earth’s crust and more heat flow from below. On top of that, a series of fault-line “troughs” documented between the basins appear “tailor-made to promote outward flow of ice streams from the interior” into the world’s oceans, he said. That said, the team’s findings are unlikely to end this debate. As Goodge noted, Antarctica is “the last continental frontier of scientific exploration.” It’s still a very mysterious place, one that’s challenging to study given its inhospitable temperatures and extreme geography. Its “cryptic subglacial geology” might stay that way for a while. #Scientists #ContinentSized #Geological #Structure #Hiding #Beneath #AntarcticaAntarctica,Geology,mapping,Plate tectonics")
![Scientists Found a Continent-Sized Geological Structure Hiding Beneath Antarctica
The East Antarctic Ice Sheet is almost unfathomably huge. Covering about 75% of the entire frigid continent (nearly everything on its side of the Transantarctic Mountains), the sheet covers about 3.9 million square miles (10.2 million square kilometers) and extends down 1.4 miles (2.2 km), on average, before coming into contact with Earth’s surface. At its deepest, the ice plunges down over 3 miles (4.9 km). For decades, scientists assumed that this literally continent-sized block of ice rested on an expansive and stable chunk of Earth’s crust known as a craton. A team of researchers has now complicated that picture—mapping a vast, interconnected geological structure that fans out from a troubling “tectonic deformation.” Beneath this ice sheet, thinner and more geologically recent slices of crusty lithosphere fan out into hidden valleys called “pull-apart basins.” These basins—30 elongated wedge-shaped valleys in total—constitute an entirely new, continental-scale geological region underneath Antarctica, in fact, one which the researchers have named the East Antarctic Fan-Shaped Basin Province (EAFBP). But it’s how they likely formed that has now caught researchers’ attention.
To put it bluntly, it turns out that about 90% of the planet’s fresh water ice may not be on solid ground. Geologist John Goodge called the team’s findings “provocative” in an independent commentary on the new study, published Thursday in the journal Nature Geoscience.
“East Antarctica is typically considered from seismic tomography and geodetics to be ancient and generally stable,” according to Goodge, who studies continental tectonics with the nonprofit Planetary Science Institute. “[But] something else is going on at depth.” Continental divides Goodge speculates that this seemingly “coherent pull-apart system,” as presented in the new study, might help explain a variety of mysterious heat and water flows beneath this ice sheet’s surface, like that enormous subglacial lake identified in 2016 or some of the hundreds more like it.
The study’s authors, led by geophysicist Egidio Armadillo at the University of Genoa in Italy, agreed: “Because these basins underlie about half of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet, they are likely to heavily influence both ice-flow and landscape evolution,” the researchers wrote in their study, also published Thursday in Nature Geoscience. Armadillo’s team, coordinating across Europe and the U.K., developed their new understanding of Antarctica’s hidden bedrock via an exhaustive set of sensory data. Gravitational and magnetic anomalies were mapped via low-altitude airborne surveys. Ground surface features were mapped with seismic tools, using sound waves that vibrate through the ice and ping back information about subglacial landscapes in 3D. The grey, magenta, and cyan lines represent the apparent new fault lines discovered. Credit: Nature Geoscience All of this data—the fruits of “multi-national efforts to image within and below the ice sheet,” as Goodge put it—had already revealed that regions of the continent were “undergoing more rapid movement and ice-mass loss than previously recognized.” Armadillo’s team merely helped to explain why.
The mechanism Armadillo and his colleagues proposed for the formation of these fan-shaped basins is called “distributed rotational extension.” It involves points called Euler poles around which tectonic plates pivot or rotate rather than smash into each other or pull apart. The result is a bit like decks of cards being spread out on a table, thinning out the stack of Earth’s crust as it moves. An icy situation Goodge took pains to spell out the basins’ implications for melting Antarctic ice due to climate change and the risk of rising global sea levels.
The mere existence of these basins, he wrote, “could introduce widespread, systemic instability to the East Antarctic Ice Sheet” via thinner layers of Earth’s crust and more heat flow from below. On top of that, a series of fault-line “troughs” documented between the basins appear “tailor-made to promote outward flow of ice streams from the interior” into the world’s oceans, he said. That said, the team’s findings are unlikely to end this debate. As Goodge noted, Antarctica is “the last continental frontier of scientific exploration.” It’s still a very mysterious place, one that’s challenging to study given its inhospitable temperatures and extreme geography. Its “cryptic subglacial geology” might stay that way for a while. #Scientists #ContinentSized #Geological #Structure #Hiding #Beneath #AntarcticaAntarctica,Geology,mapping,Plate tectonics](https://i0.wp.com/gizmodo.com/app/uploads/2026/06/East-Antarctic-Fan-shaped-Basin-Province.jpeg?ssl=1 "Scientists Found a Continent-Sized Geological Structure Hiding Beneath Antarctica
The East Antarctic Ice Sheet is almost unfathomably huge. Covering about 75% of the entire frigid continent (nearly everything on its side of the Transantarctic Mountains), the sheet covers about 3.9 million square miles (10.2 million square kilometers) and extends down 1.4 miles (2.2 km), on average, before coming into contact with Earth’s surface. At its deepest, the ice plunges down over 3 miles (4.9 km). For decades, scientists assumed that this literally continent-sized block of ice rested on an expansive and stable chunk of Earth’s crust known as a craton. A team of researchers has now complicated that picture—mapping a vast, interconnected geological structure that fans out from a troubling “tectonic deformation.” Beneath this ice sheet, thinner and more geologically recent slices of crusty lithosphere fan out into hidden valleys called “pull-apart basins.” These basins—30 elongated wedge-shaped valleys in total—constitute an entirely new, continental-scale geological region underneath Antarctica, in fact, one which the researchers have named the East Antarctic Fan-Shaped Basin Province (EAFBP). But it’s how they likely formed that has now caught researchers’ attention.
To put it bluntly, it turns out that about 90% of the planet’s fresh water ice may not be on solid ground. Geologist John Goodge called the team’s findings “provocative” in an independent commentary on the new study, published Thursday in the journal Nature Geoscience.
“East Antarctica is typically considered from seismic tomography and geodetics to be ancient and generally stable,” according to Goodge, who studies continental tectonics with the nonprofit Planetary Science Institute. “[But] something else is going on at depth.” Continental divides Goodge speculates that this seemingly “coherent pull-apart system,” as presented in the new study, might help explain a variety of mysterious heat and water flows beneath this ice sheet’s surface, like that enormous subglacial lake identified in 2016 or some of the hundreds more like it.
The study’s authors, led by geophysicist Egidio Armadillo at the University of Genoa in Italy, agreed: “Because these basins underlie about half of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet, they are likely to heavily influence both ice-flow and landscape evolution,” the researchers wrote in their study, also published Thursday in Nature Geoscience. Armadillo’s team, coordinating across Europe and the U.K., developed their new understanding of Antarctica’s hidden bedrock via an exhaustive set of sensory data. Gravitational and magnetic anomalies were mapped via low-altitude airborne surveys. Ground surface features were mapped with seismic tools, using sound waves that vibrate through the ice and ping back information about subglacial landscapes in 3D. The grey, magenta, and cyan lines represent the apparent new fault lines discovered. Credit: Nature Geoscience All of this data—the fruits of “multi-national efforts to image within and below the ice sheet,” as Goodge put it—had already revealed that regions of the continent were “undergoing more rapid movement and ice-mass loss than previously recognized.” Armadillo’s team merely helped to explain why.
The mechanism Armadillo and his colleagues proposed for the formation of these fan-shaped basins is called “distributed rotational extension.” It involves points called Euler poles around which tectonic plates pivot or rotate rather than smash into each other or pull apart. The result is a bit like decks of cards being spread out on a table, thinning out the stack of Earth’s crust as it moves. An icy situation Goodge took pains to spell out the basins’ implications for melting Antarctic ice due to climate change and the risk of rising global sea levels.
The mere existence of these basins, he wrote, “could introduce widespread, systemic instability to the East Antarctic Ice Sheet” via thinner layers of Earth’s crust and more heat flow from below. On top of that, a series of fault-line “troughs” documented between the basins appear “tailor-made to promote outward flow of ice streams from the interior” into the world’s oceans, he said. That said, the team’s findings are unlikely to end this debate. As Goodge noted, Antarctica is “the last continental frontier of scientific exploration.” It’s still a very mysterious place, one that’s challenging to study given its inhospitable temperatures and extreme geography. Its “cryptic subglacial geology” might stay that way for a while. #Scientists #ContinentSized #Geological #Structure #Hiding #Beneath #AntarcticaAntarctica,Geology,mapping,Plate tectonics")
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