Whale watching off California’s coast might become far scarcer in the near future because the U.S. Supreme Court ignored pleas from environmentalists about the potentially deadly effects of sonar last week.
The court determined that U.S. Navy high-intensity sonar practices on the West Coast were national security issues that outweigh all environmental concerns.
The case emerged when environmental groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council, objected last year to the Navy conducting 14 high-frequency sonar tests off California’s coast. The groups claimed the Navy failed to prepare an environmental impact report prior to conducting the exercises, consequently violating the National Environmental Policy Act.
The organizations contend that the sonar severely harms — and even kills — whales and other ocean mammals with its ear-piercing frequencies.
The NRDC used Navy estimates to show the court that sonar could place at least 170,000 marine mammals in harm’s way, potentially causing permanent injury to 500 whales and leading to temporary deafness in “at least 8,000 whales.”
The case was filed after the Navy refused a U.S. District Court to cease exercises within 12 miles of the coast or other offshore areas “where marine mammals congregate” the Los Angeles Times summarized.
That court ordered ships to turn off sonar when a whale or other mammal was spotted within 1.2 miles, an order that was later upheld by the U.S. 9th District Court of Appeals.
But Bush wouldn’t take “no” for an answer from the lowly federal judges, especially knowing he had conservative Chief Justice John Roberts in his hip pocket.
“The president — the commander in chief — has determined that the training with active sonar is ‘essential to the national security,'” Roberts said of the decision.
Of course, these are the same Bushites that smelled weapons of mass destruction under every rock in Iraq, even though none were ever found.
This issue is about defenseless ocean wildlife. Roberts was hasty in his evaluation that sonar is not harmful to marine wildlife. Studies have proven that the piercing sonar sounds force “whales to flee in panic or dive too deeply,” the NRDC asserts.
“High-intensity [mid-frequency active] sonar can blast vast areas of the oceans with dangerous levels of underwater noise, and has killed marine mammals in numerous incidents …,” according to nrdc.org.
The group adds that “five endangered species of whales, a globally important population of blue whales … and as many as seven individual species of beaked whales, which are known to be particularly vulnerable to underwater sound” are at great risk of the exercises.
Other conservationists like the Cetacean Society International and the International Fund for Animal Welfare provided evidence that whales have beached around the world following sonar exercises, and that “necropsies showed signs of internal bleeding near the ears.”
But Roberts and the Supreme Court weren’t interested in “evidence.”
We only hope that President-elect Barack Obama has more concern with our oceanic wildlife. As commander in chief, he will have the power to override the Supreme Court’s decision.
This should not be an issue where “Flipper” and other sea mammals’ voices fall on the deaf ears of a human court.