July 19, 2016 โ The US Navy is now using a particular type of sonar in more than half of the worldโs oceans under an illegal permit. That sonar harms marine mammals like whales, dolphins, seals, and walruses. On Friday, the Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals in California found that a 2012 regulation that allowed the Navy to use a low-frequency active sonar for training and testing violates the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
โThe court found that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), which gave the authorization, isnโt doing enough to avoid harming or killing marine mammals under the law. The Marine Mammal Protection Act calls for the โleast practicable adverse impactโ on marine mammals and their habitats. The court also found that the federal agency failed to protect areas of the world that its own government experts had flagged as โbiologically importantโ to protect marine life. Such areas include the Galapagos Islands off the coast of Ecuador, the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument off of Hawaii, and Challenger Bank off of Bermuda.
The Navy had been authorized to use the high-intensity long-range sonar โ called low-frequency active sonar, or LFA โ for five years across more than 70 percent of the worldโs oceans, in areas of the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans and the Mediterranean Sea. The NMFS has to set certain limits to activities, like military training, that could harm marine mammals. The goal is to reduce the impact on marine life to its lowest possible level.