Pacific Views

Small Victory for Ocean Mammals

It isn't often lately that we get good news about the environment, but today, I found some. A case against the deployment of a highly damaging sonar system by the Navy was successful. Some particulars:

...The sonar system, known as Surveillance Towed Array Sensor System Low Frequency Active sonar (or LFA), relies on extremely loud, low-frequency sound to detect submarines at great distances. According to the Navy's own studies, LFA generates sounds up to 140 decibels even more than 300 miles away from the sonar source. Many scientists believe that blasting such intense sounds over large expanses of the ocean could harm entire populations of whales, porpoises and fish. During testing off the California coast, noise from a single LFA system was detected across the breadth of the North Pacific Ocean.

...The mass stranding of multiple whale species in the Bahamas in March 2000 and the simultaneous disappearance of the region's entire population of beaked whales intensified these concerns. A federal investigation identified testing of a U.S. Navy mid-frequency active sonar system as the cause. Last September, mass strandings occurred in the Canary Islands as a result of military sonar, and in the Gulf of California as the likely result of an acoustic geophysical survey using extremely loud air guns.

Most recently, more than a dozen harbor porpoises were found dead on the beach near the San Juan Islands soon after the Navy tested active sonar in the Haro Strait in May. Videotape shows a pod of orca whales in the foreground behaving erratically as the Shoup, a U.S. Navy vessel, emits loud sonar blasts. Recent tests on one of the harbor porpoises revealed injuries consistent with acoustic trauma. ...

Let's hope this one got by under the radar of those vultures in the Bush administration. Otherwise we'll be hearing about the countermove on the usual Friday afternoon release.

If insisting that the courts enforce our environmental legislation appeals to you, than you might consider giving the Natural Resources Defense Council a contribution.