The U.S. Navy's use of mid-frequency, high intensity active sonar is causing mass strandings and deaths of whales, according to a coalition of conservation and animal welfare groups that is threatening to take formal action against the Navy to force a change in its use of the sonar signals.
In a letter sent Wednesday to Navy Secretary Gordon England, the coalition detailed many mass strandings and mortalities of whales associated with the Navy's testing and training with these sonar systems.
The coalition includes the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), The Humane Society of the United States, and Jean-Michel Cousteau's Ocean Futures Society.
They say the Navy's "largely unmitigated and unpermitted use" of this sonar is in violation of the Endangered Species Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act.
The most recent incident cited by the coalition occured on July 3 during RIMPAC military exercises near the Hawaiian island of Kauai. A mass of 100 to 200 melon-headed whales that usually remain in deep water swam close to shore in Hanalei Bay early in the morning. They appeared in distress and would not return to sea until members of the Hanalei Canoe Club used vines instead of ropes to herd them out into open water. An infant melon-headed whale beached and died later that day.
Melon-headed whale. These small, black whales are found worldwide in tropical and subtropical waters traveling in groups of 100 to 1,000. (Photo courtesy NOAA)
Navy Lt. Erik Reynolds told the "Honolulu Advertiser" that four Japanese ships and two U.S. Navy ships were tracking an underwater target, a torpedo that sounds on sonar like a submarine, on the Pacific Missile Range Facility underwater test range that morning.
The nearest military ship was 19 miles from Hanalei during the exercises, he said. The ships turned off their sonar when advised of the whales in distress. The incident is under investigation by NOAA Fisheries officials.
Dr. Naomi Rose, marine mammal scientist for Humane Society said, "Right now nobody knows if sonar is to blame, but this incident was similar enough to previous stranding events caused by sonar that we think the Navy needs to investigate it thoroughly and transparently."
As of January 2004, 58 percent of the Navy's 294 surface ships and submarines were equipped with at least one form of mid-frequency active sonar, and of the 161 ships and submarines planned or under construction, 93 are to be similarly equipped, the coalition wrote in its letter to Secretary England. Mid-frequency systems are also air-deployed via helicopter, fixed-wing aircraft, and sonobuoys.
Mid-frequency sonar systems can generate sounds louder than 215 decibels. Intense blasts of mid-frequency sonar can, either directly or indirectly, damage vital organs and cause internal bleeding in marine mammals, the coalition says, citing an article last year in the scientific journal "Nature."
In their letter to Secretary England, the coalition describes another incident during which mid-frequency sonar is believed to have harmed whales, this one in the Bahamas.
They wrote, "In March 2000, for example, seventeen whales from at least three species, including two minke whales, stranded over 150 miles of shoreline along the northern channels of the Bahamas. These beachings occurred within 24 hours of Navy ships using mid-frequency sonar in those same channels."
"Post-mortem examinations found, in all whales examined, hemorrhaging in and around the ears and other tissues related to sound conduction or production, such as the larynx and auditory fats, some of which was debilitative and potentially severe. It is now accepted that these mortalities were caused, through an unknown mechanism, by the Navy's use of mid-frequency sonar."
"Without reasonable limits, the proliferation of high intensity sonar will cause excruciating pain, injury and death for an increasing number of marine mammals," said Frederick O'Regan, president of IFAW.
Last year, the Navy agreed to scale back deployment of a different kind of sonar system, which uses low-frequency sound waves, after losing a lawsuit brought by groups in the coalition. In that case, a federal court ruled that the Navy's permit to use low-frequency sonar violated the same three laws because it did not adequately assess or take steps to mitigate the risks posed by the system to marine mammals and fish.
The Navy maintains that both types of sonar are necessary to detect quiet enemy submarines.
From left, Joel Reynolds, director of the Marine Mammal Protection Project at NRDC; Jean-Michel Cousteau, president of Ocean Futures Society; Pierce Brosnan, actor and conservationist; and Frederick O'Regan, president of IFAW, announce that the Navy agreed to reduce use of low-frequency sonar. October 13, 2003. (Photo courtesy NRDC)
"There are effective ways to reduce harm to marine life that do not interfere with military readiness," said Joel Reynolds, a senior attorney and director of NRDC's Marine Mammal Protection Project. "The Navy is needlessly endangering whole populations of marine mammals."
The coalition suggests that the Navy could identify low-risk areas for routine training consistent with mission demands, establish safety zones around transmit vessels, and reduce the source level of sonar signals.
In addition, the Navy should avoid beaked whale habitat in the siting of sonar tests and exercises and avoid concentrations of other marine mammals by conducting pre-operational surveys. After testing, more surveys should be conducted to find dead or injured marine mammals and other species, the coalition wrote.
And the coalition is urging the Navy to explore the potential of less intrusive, alternative technologies to substitute for the mid-frequency sonar systems, and provide funding for development of promising alternatives identified in this process.
"We'd rather not resort to litigation," said Reynolds, "so we are once again asking the Navy to sit down to discuss this in a spirit of cooperation. The Navy can no longer ignore the unnecessary infliction of harm associated with this technology."
But Reynolds says the Navy has failed to respond to previous requests by NRDC for talks about ways to reduce the impacts of its sonar programs.
Marine mammals depend on sound to navigate, find food, locate mates, avoid predators, and communicate with each other. The coalition maintains that blasting their environment with intense sound over large expanses of ocean disrupts these behaviors and may threaten their survival.
"We owe it to our children to be better stewards of the environment by protecting our ocean friends and their ecosystem," said Jean-Michel Cousteau, founder and president of Ocean Futures Society.
The coalition's letter to Secretary England is online at: http://www.nrdc.org/media/docs/040714.pdf
