In this work we propose to model ice shedding by an innovative paradigm that is based on cartesian grids, penalization and level sets. The use of cartesian grids bypass the meshing issue in complex geometries and moreover allows extensions to higher order accuracy in a natural and simple way. Penalization is an efficient alternative to explicitly impose boundary conditions so that the body fitted meshes can be avoided, making multi fluid/multi physics flows easy to set up and simulate. Level sets describe the geometry in a non-parametric way so that geometrical and topological changes due to physics and in particular ice-shedding are straight forward to follow.