July 14, 2022 — A federal circuit court has reinstated a ban on lobster fishing gear in a nearly 1,000-square-mile area off New England to try to protect endangered whales.
The National Marine Fisheries Service issued new regulations last year that prohibited lobster fishing with vertical buoy lines in part of the fall and winter in the area, which is in federal waters off Maine’s coast. The ruling was intended to prevent North Atlantic right whales, which number less than 340, from becoming entangled in the lines.
The circuit court sent the case back to the district court level, but noted in its ruling that it does not think the lobster fishing groups that sued to stop the regulations are likely to succeed because Congress has clearly instructed the fisheries service to protect the whales.
Commercial fishing groups have filed lawsuits about new rules designed to protect the whales because of concerns that the regulations will make it impossible to sustain the lobster fishing industry. The industry, based mostly in Maine, is one of the most valuable in the U.S., worth more than $500 million at the docks in 2020, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Conservation groups have called for tighter laws. Tuesday’s ruling is “a lifesaving decision for these beautiful, vulnerable whales,” said Kristen Monsell, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity who argued the case at the circuit court.