This is speculation, but it seems to me that icebergs would not necessarily be seen at their most southerly limits in the coldest winters, as very cold weather, which would also tend to be calmer, would tend to keep ice from breaking up, whereas mild weather with strong winds would tend to make ice move (admitedly it would tend to be winds from the north which would blow icerbergs to the south, and north winds tend to be cold in the North Atlantic). Perhaps I am completely wrong on this.
I have read recently (I think it was on the UK Weatherworld forum) that the reason the iceberg (which was said to be 50-100 feet high, and presumably there were several hundred more feet below the water level) which collided with the Titanic in April 1912 was further south than usual was because of strong persistent strong North-easterly winds (although the night, 14th/15th April, when the collision occurred was clear and calm). As the map showing the location of icebergs which were seen unusually far south shows, on one occasion an iceberg was seen south of the Azores!
Is there a definition of an ice-berg, as opposed to an ice-floe? Certainly the sea around the British Isles has frozen locally in severe winters, even in recent years (I think this may have happened very locally even in February 2012) but I had not heard of "icebergs" off the Irish coast before. I do remember reading that one winter many years ago (it could have been in 17th, 18th or 19th centuries) that an Eskimo drifted on an ice floe to the coast near Aberdeen. I think Polar Bears have also been seen off Iceland for similar reasons.
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