Fascinating Huge Crack Opens In Lake Erie As Water Keeps Freezing

Satellite view of the large crack that developed Sunday
on the ice covering almost all of Lake Erie.

 Lake watchers got really fascinated with Lake Erie on Sunday. 

In just a matter of hours Sunday, a huge crack opened across the mostly frozen lake.

Satellite loops caught it. So did passengers on planes flying over Lake Erie. And people who live on bluffs in Cleveland looking out over the lake. 

The crack quickly widened on Sunday to about 80 miles long starting near Port Burwell in Canada to around Cleveland, Ohio. It's fascinating to watch the split appear on satellite loops.

Before this weekend, Lake Erie was about 95 percent frozen.  Strong northwest winds on Saturday   The northwest winds also piled up  chunks of Lake Erie ice up to 20 feet deep on its southeastern shore.  That movement probably weakened the ice in the middle of the lake.

Then on Sunday, light northeast winds helped  la"unzip" the crack southwestward across the lake.  The crack is another demonstration that a frozen lake isn't necessarily safe to walk or drive on. 

A person with the handle Rebsjoy on Threads
took this photo Sunday of the Lake Erie ice cracks 
while aboard a plane crossing over the lake

Lake Erie freezes more readily than the other Great Lakes because it's the shallowest of the five. Since it's shallow, you get less upwelling of slightly warmer water from the depths. 

Still, if Lake Erie freezes over entirely this week, it'll be only the fourth time since 1973 that has happened. 

Overall, the five Great Lakes were 53 percent frozen over as of yesterday. The least frozen of the lakes is Ontario. It was only 26 percent frozen. 

As weather patterns shift, there is other ice news to report. After quite a cold spell, record high temperatures were hitting central Nebraska today. Ice on the Platte River has broken up, leading to ice jams and flooding. 

As of this writing, around 2 p.m. today, I don't yet have word yet on whether Lake Champlain has entirely frozen over. The National Weather Service office in South Burlington will make the call. 

Even if it is frozen, Lake Champlain is not necessarily safe to walk on. 

Earlier this month, five skaters had to be rescued from the lake when the ice they were on broke off and started floating into a then-open section of the lake.