Navy Cancels LFA Sonar Test
Richard
Yesterday, I received word from Andrew Wetzler at the Natural Resources
Defense Council that the United States Navy officially cancelled the LWAD
00-2 Sea Test scheduled to begin this week off the east coast of the United
States. For those interested in the details of this event, I have provided
below a chronology. The cancellation of LWAD 00-2 is a remarkable victory
for those devoted to protecting marine life, especially cetaceans, from the
unwise technological decisions being made by humans in the United States
Navy. Congratulations to everyone involved in achieving this outcome.
The next major developments, as far as I know, will come from the hearing
scheduled in Honolulu before Judge Alan C. Kay on June 13 at 9:00 a.m. A
suit filed in February challenges the environmental impact statement (EIS)
process being conducted by the Navy for its low frequency active sonar
system. The central challenge is that the entire EIS process is compromised
by the fact that the Navy spent at least $350 million preparing to deploy
this system without preparing an EIS first, as required by law. The hearing
will consider the defendants' motion to dismiss the case and a motion filed
by plaintiffs' counsel seeking to reopen a 1998 LFAS case for further
litigation.
CHRONOLOGY - LWAD 00-2 CANCELLATION
Week of March 13-17 - Seventeen whales strand in Bahamas at the same time
Navy conducts tests using various active sonar devices, including high
intensity (200 dB) broadcasts. The tests are known as Littoral Warfare
Advanced Development (LWAD) Sea Tests. The Bahamas test is LWAD 00-1. Navy
claims coincidence. Stranded whales come from at least four different
species in three families of two suborders of cetaceans, including
Balaenoptera sp., Ziphius cavirostris, Mesoplodon densirostris, Stenella
frontalis, and Balaenoptera acutorostrata.
March 21, 2000 - Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and Humane Society
of the United States (HSUS) send letter to Secretary of the Navy Danzig
demanding a suspension of such tests. Further tests are scheduled in late
May.
March 22, 2000 - Attorney for plaintiffs in Hawai'i case challenging
deployment of low frequency active sonar sends formal notice to Secretaries
of Commerce and Navy that Bahamian tests violated environmental laws,
including Endanger Species Act.
March 24 - HSUS, the nation's largest animal protection organization,
demands that the United States Navy suspend upcoming tests involving active
sonar systems.
March 31, 2000 - Attorney for plaintiffs in Hawai`i cases sends letter to
Secretary of Commerce calling upon the Secretary to notify the Navy that
further LWAD testing without formal consultation and permits from National
Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) would be a criminal violation of the
Endangered Species Act.
April 5, 2000 - After less than thirty days of analysis, US Navy concludes
that testing in the Bahamas did not cause strandings and deaths of whales.
[Note: Scientists conducting 1998 studies of affects of LFAS on whales are
still analyzing the data two years later.]
April 21, 2000 - Navy issues press release again concluding that LWAD 00-2
could not be responsible for the strandings and deaths in the Bahamas. The
release does state that a U.S. fleet in the same area broadcast sonar
signals from five ships and one submarine in the time frame of the
strandings. A Navy/NMFS investigation continues.
April 24, 2000 - Navy submits Overseas Environmental Assessment (OEA) to
NMFS requesting concurrence in LWAD 00-2. As was the case for LWAD 00-1,
the Navy seeks agreement based on informal consultations. Such a process
confines the discussion to a Navy-NMFS dialogue with the public rarely
becoming aware of the project. In this case, however, the disaster in the
Bahamas brought elevated public attention brought to the LWAD testing
program. NRDC secures a copy of the OEA and makes the document available to
people working on potential litigation to stop LWAD 00-2 and others.
Late April/early May - information begins to emerge indicating that NMFS
personnel are dissatisfied with the process underway and the OEA. The Navy
provided less than thirty days in which to review the OEA, placing NMFS
personnel under pressure to simply agree. NMFS personnel are not pleased
with the late filing and concerned about what appears in the OEA.
May 5, 2000 - NMFS sends a letter to the Navy stating that "we are not able
to concur with your determination that the proposed action is not likely to
adversely affect listed species under the National Marine Fisheries Service'
s jurisdiction." The letter stated that additional time would be needed to
complete the review. Given the short time frame available, the letter
requested the Navy to postpone the operation.
May 9, 2000 - Attorney for plaintiffs in LFA Hawai`i litigation sends
extensive comments on the OEA to NMFS. The essence of the comments are (1)
the informal consultation process should stop and a formal process be
initiated, in part to allow for public participation; (2) the events in the
Bahamas and the emerging evidence of shock trauma call for extraordinary
caution in allowing more tests; (3) the March 21 NRDC/HSUS letter to the
Secretary of the Navy provides additional legal and scientific concerns that
need to be considered before relying upon informal consultations to concur
in the LWAD 00-2 test; (4) the OEA did not address at all what happened in
the Bahamas; (5) the sonar activities of the naval fleet in the Bahamas
suggest the possibility of synergistic impacts from LWAD 00-1 and the fleet
sonars; (6) the OEA is seriously deficient because there is no discussion of
the Bahamas, there is no discussion of the history of cetacean strandings
and deaths now associated with low frequency active sonar (e.g.
Mediterranean 1996), such as LWAD 00-2 intends to use, the cetacean exposure
levels set forth as safe rely on a reference that directly contradicts the
claimed safety or rely on a single study on one species to generalize to
numerous species. [Presumably others are sending in comments as well, which
as yet are not available to include in this chronology.]
May 10, 2000 - Environmental groups and scientists hold a press conference
in Washington, D.C. calling for a moratorium on any further high intensity
sonar testing. At the press conference, Ken Balcomb, Director of the Center
for Whale Research, reports on the emerging evidence that the whale deaths
in the Bahamas trace to some form of shock. Blood in the eyes, blood in the
brains, and damage to lungs all point to some explosive or high intensity
source. Dr. Marsha Green, Ocean Mammal Institute, discusses the impact of
sound on cetaceans. Dr. Naomi Rose, Director of the Humane Society of the
United States, issues the call for the moratorium. Dr. Charles Bernard,
former Navy weapons development specialist, criticizes the LFAS technology
from a military perspective.
May 15, 2000 - Attorney for plaintiffs in LFA litigation sends second
comments to NFMS. The comments direct NFMS attention to evidence in the
Navy's draft EIS for LFAS deployment, which demonstrates that the claims of
safe levels in the OEA actually derive from the Scientific Research Program
conducted as part of the draft EIS preparation. The comments suggest that
the Navy failure to include the draft EIS information with the OEA
constituted a serious omission and that had those documents been included,
NMFS would have been required to wait because regulatory decisions cannot be
made based on draft documents.
May 9-19, 2000 - Intense pressure placed on NMFS to prevent finding that
formal consultations are required. Environmentalists, scientists, and other
citizens opposed to LFAS deployment mount campaign to build support for NMFS
staff recommendations.
May 19, 2000 - Patricia Kurkul, Regional Administrator, Northeast Region,
NMFS sends letter to Navy stating that NMFS is "not able to concur with your
determination that the proposed action is not likely to adversely affect
listed species." The letter cites to the limited time given to NMFS to
review the project; the deficiencies in the OEA, including a failure to
include the latest evidence available on various issues; the imprecise
descriptions given of the intensity of planned broadcasts; questionable
evidence, methodology, and conclusions regarding impacts on marine life; and
inadequate discussion of potential impacts on turtles. The letter concludes
that "NMFS recommends formal consultation under Section 7 of the [Endangered
Species Act].
May 25, 2000 - Navy cancels LWAD 00-2. Density surveys of marine mammals
will be conducted using only commercial locators and passive arrays. There
will be no use of low frequency active sonar.
For further information or to request periodic updates, send an email to
li...@ilhawaii.net
For information about the litigation: http://go.to/lfaslawsuit or
http://www.ilhawaii.net/~light/lfaindex.html
For further action you can take: http://manyrooms.com/contacts.html
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