Sonar killing marine animals

While the connection between high-intensity naval sonars and the mass strandings and deaths of whales, dolphins and porpoises has become clear, it is not yet clear what people will choose to do about it. This past year has seen the continued use of these sonars and the resulting strandings and deaths, as well as battles in court and in Congress over this issue.

In August, federal judge Elizabeth Laporte decided to restrict the use of the Navy’s Low Frequency Active (LFA) sonar. The negotiated limitations allow for deployment of the sonar in 1.5 million square miles of ocean along the eastern seaboard of Asia. Given the intensity of the sound and its ability to travel through water over great distances, vast areas of ocean will still be impacted and no doubt, large numbers of whales will still die. All restraints will go out the window during war or “heightened threat conditions” as determined by the military.

On May 5 the USS Shoup, a guided-missile destroyer based in Everett, Wash., was using its mid-frequency 53C sonar in Haro Strait. 53C is the same type of sonar which caused the well-known mass stranding and deaths of whales and dolphins in March 2000 in the Bahamas. Although the Shoup was miles from the coastline, the sonar pings were loud enough to be heard in the air by people on shore.

Scientists and observers on whale watch boats witnessed panicked behavior as dozens of orcas and porpoises and a minke whale attempted to flee the sound. The Shoup had also been using its sonar in the area on April 23 and 24. In a month’s time, 16 porpoises were found dead. Radiological tests were performed on one of the porpoises, along with the ear bones from a Baird’s beaked whale that stranded at La Push on Jan. 22. Both showed evidence of injuries consistent with hemorrhagic trauma that could be due to naval sonar. Necropsies have been performed on 10 of the porpoises but reports are not yet out.

The Baird’s beaked whale stranded in an area where the U.S. aircraft carrier Carl Vinson and escort ships had been operating sonar before they were sent over to the Persian Gulf. Following time in the Gulf, the Carl Vinson engaged in exercises off the west coast of Australia which coincided in time and location with yet another mass stranding of more than a dozen beaked whales.

On Sept. 24, 2002, a mass stranding of 14 beaked whales occurred in the Canary Islands during NATO naval exercises known as Neo Tapon 2002. Again, mid-frequency 53C sonar was in use. A team of Spanish scientists carried out necropsies on 10 of the whales.

In an article which appears in this October’s issue of the journal Nature, they report finding tissue from the whales riddled with holes suggesting the whales had suffered a form of decompression sickness, or “the bends.” It isn’t clear whether upon hearing the sonar, the whales panicked and surfaced too rapidly, causing decompression sickness, or if the sonar itself initiated bubble growth in the blood and tissue. But an article theorizing just that scenario was written by Navy scientists and published in 2001 in the Journal of Theoretical Biology. In either case, the results are the same: dead whales.

The question is, what will we do about it? The military is now attempting to exempt itself from two federal laws which offer protection for whales and other marine mammals; the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The exemptions are part of the Defense Authorization Bill and are being debated now in conference committee. Maine’s congressional delegation has done very good work in opposing these exemptions so far, but no matter what, if the exemptions make it into the final bill they should vote against it. To do otherwise will in effect be signing the death warrants for large numbers of whales, dolphins and porpoises; possibly entire species of these animals. That cannot be justified.

A Navy spokesman has stated that even if further research implicates sonar, the number of whales killed by sonar is small compared to those killed by fishing nets. Even if that were true, that does not excuse the Navy’s killings. It should be pointed out that sonar-related whale deaths we know about are likely only the very, very tip of the iceberg. Most whales that are killed probably sink to the sea floor unknown to us, especially those that are far from shore. Very possibly entire populations have already been wiped out, as seems to have been the case in the Bahamas event. That is inexcusable.

The U.S. Navy, and other navies which are developing, testing and deploying these dangerous sonars, and the politicians who allow their use must be held accountable for the slaughter of these innocents.

Russell Wray, of Sullivan, works with Citizens Opposing Active Sonar Threats.