California judges stops sonar testing of whales
Date: 10-Jan-03
Country: USA
The three-week project, designed by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute of Massachusetts and approved by the National Marine Fisheries Service, would have tested whether sonar could prevent whales from colliding with ships or from being injured in underwater demolition. Researchers intended to broadcast high-frequency sound pulses toward gray whales migrating south along the California coast.
But environmentalists argued that the sound pulses interfered with communication between female whales and their calves and could send the whales off course.
U.S. District Judge Samuel Conti delayed the start of testing until at least Jan. 17, when he will decide whether researchers followed proper environmental review procedures.
U.S. Justice Department attorney Maureen Rudolph, who represented the fisheries service, said the delay will "most likely" mean that the project won't proceed this year because the whales may have migrated past the research point.
The lawsuit, filed on Tuesday in San Francisco, named five environmental groups and the gray whales as plaintiffs. Conti dismissed the whales from the suit, saying the giant mammals would not be able to testify or sign papers and were not "live human beings, an association or a corporation."
Robin Mankey of plaintiff Sea Sanctuary, nonetheless hailed the ruling as a victory. "It was a great day for whales," she said.
The ruling is the third by a Northern California judge to block sonar testing in California coastal waters.
In October, a San Francisco federal judge blocked a plan by the U.S. Navy - also approved by the National Marine Fisheries Service - to test a new high-intensity sonar for detecting enemy submarines. The plan was later scaled back in an agreement reached by the Navy and four environmental groups that sued to stop the testing.
In a separate case in October, a San Francisco federal judge ordered the National Science Foundation to stop firing loud sonic blasts from air guns in the Gulf of California.
Both cases were linked to mass whale deaths.