The brittle failure of ice under compression

This paper reviews progress during the past decade in understanding the brittle compressive failure of ice. Evidence is presented for the frictional crack sliding-wing mechanism and for the role of localized fragmentation. The ductile-to-brittle transition is explained in terms of the suppression of crack growth and is modeled in terms of Ashby-Hallam wing crack mechanics and Riedel-Rice crack-tip creep. The brittle compressive strength is related to ice-ice friction. Modeling and experiment suggest that the transition strain rate of cracked ice scales as (crack size)(-1.5) and that its brittle strength scales as (crack size)(-0.5), at least for small specimens. Possible size effects are noted.