Iceberg heading for Malaga's main shopping street breaks on way to city

An iceberg that was set to be displayed in Calle Larios as part of an arctic exhibition in the city has broken during its transfer to Malaga.

The idea was to sit the iceberg from Greenland in the city's main shopping street and let it melt to raise awareness about climate change. But the great 15-tonne attraction of the Arctic Challenge project will not go ahead, due to a technical problem in the transfer which broke the iceberg.

SUR in English reported on the project led by Malaga adventurer Manolo Calvo in July this year. The educational venture in Greenland involved young people who had overcome cancer.

"The change that has taken place in a matter of five years is alarming. Where there used to be ice and large glaciers, there are areas where there is nothing left," he told SUR.

That is when he came up with the idea of raising awareness among the people of Malaga with a graphic example. He wanted to reproduce in Malaga city what is happening in the Arctic and what has the scientific community on alert.

Calvo stated at the time that it would not be easy to bring the iceberg to Malaga. Manolo Calvo's son was in charge of coordinating the transfer. "It's not that we arrived in Greenland and just thought of bringing an iceberg home. It is a project that has been in the works for seven months and that has all the relevant permits," Calvo said. He calculated that the arrival of the iceberg would be towards the end of August or the start of September, and that at that time - at the beginning of August - it was in a container, at 22 degrees below zero, in the port of Nuuk, the capital of Greenland.

"The company has taken responsibility for the incident and therefore no funds have been allocated, either directly or indirectly, for the transport of the iceberg, which in any case was already detached when it was taken," explained the organisers.