A Good Fight for a Good Whale: Ban Seismic Testing in the Atlantic
Each year, as the summer draws to a close, the North Atlantic right whales begin their incredible journey southward. For millions of years, these graceful giants have called the North Atlantic their home, migrating from their summer feeding grounds off the coast of New England to give birth in the warmer waters of Georgia and Florida each winter.
Today, fewer than 400 right whales remain, winning them the sad honor being one of the world’s most endangered animals. Given that only a few of these incredible creatures still exist we must do everything that we can to protect them. And yet, the US Department of the Interior has recently announced plans to open up right whale habitat in the Atlantic Ocean to industrial airgun blasting in search of offshore oil and gas. Read more.
Take action: Help save the right whale by sending a letter urging the Department of the Interior to abandon the proposal to allow seismic testing in the Atlantic.
Photo: North Atlantic right whale and dolphins. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, NOAA Research Permit #594-1759
Harm of Staggering Proportions to Southern California and Hawaii Whales from Navy Training
Whales and dolphins will be harmed more than 14 million times in Southern California and Hawaii waters by proposed Navy training and testing activitiesreleased this week. According to the Navy’s draft environmental impact statement for its Hawaii and Southern California activities, 2 million of those 14 million “takes” will result in temporary hearing loss and 2,000 cases of permanent hearing loss. Temporary hearing loss is an incredibly serious issue for animals that use hearing the way we use sight and, in a similar vein, it’s likely game over for any whales or dolphins that suffer permanent hearing loss. And speaking of game over, the Navy estimates that its training and testing with explosives will kill 1,000 animals over the next five years. Read more.
Photo: Hawaiian Insular False Killer Whale, NOAA
Gulf Dolphin Die-Off Is Unprecedented
What is happening to the dolphins? The rosy predictions that some have made since the Deepwater Horizon was plugged, in July 2010, have been belied by the sickening, relentless washing up of dead bottlenose dolphins on the beaches of the Northern Gulf.
With the spill’s second anniversary just around the corner, NRDC reviewed past dolphin strandings in the Gulf and compared them to the present one. Our conclusion is that the current die-off is simply unprecedented:
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) began to systematically investigate “unusual mortality events” (UMEs) of marine mammals twenty years ago, after a number of highly publicized mass strandings. Since then, the Gulf’s bottlenose dolphins have gone through 11 high mortality events aside from the present ones—accounting for one-fifth of all the UMEs that NOAA has declared for marine mammals nationwide. The dolphins’ involvement in so many of these events suggests how vulnerable they are to environmental disturbance, and perhaps how likely, as coastal mammals, they are to strand. But never have the dolphins experienced a die-off that has lasted as long, involved as many animals, or afflicted as many calves.
