U.S. to probe ‘significant die-off’ of right whales

13 THIS YEAR

BRETT BUNDALE PORTLAND, MAINE •Fearing an existential threat to one of the largest mammals in the sea, the United States government has launched an investigation into the recent deaths of endangered North Atlantic right whales.

At least 13 of the whales have been found dead this year off Atlantic Canada and New England, an unprecedented number experts say threatens the survival of the species.

“The North Atlantic right whale is one of the most critically endangered populations of large whales in the world,” David Gouveia with the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s fisheries branch said Friday.

“The population numbers are very low and recovery is very slow. It’s a significant die-off.”

In response to the troubling raft of deaths, NOAA Fisheries has declared “an unusual mortality event.”

The designation triggers a sweeping investigation into the cause of the deaths, including environmental and habitat conditions, threats from commercial fishing and shipping and other risk factors.

NOAA Fisheries officials will work with their counterparts at Fisheries and Oceans Canada on sampling and data collection, analysis and recommendations for future responses.

Matthew Hardy, aquatic resources division manager with Fisheries and Oceans, said Canadian officials expect to have necropsy results finalized by the end of September.

“This is a tremendous amount of work for the six necropsies that we completed in the Gulf of St. Lawrence,” he said. “We have specialists in zooplankton, food distribution, oceanography and toxicology to help feed into our understanding of what is actually happening.”

Ten North Atlantic right whales have been found dead in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and two have been found in U.S. waters. There have also been four whales found entangled in fishing gear and two whales successfully released.

In April, a North Atlantic right whale was found dead in Cape Cod Bay.

In all, 13 of the marine mammals have been found dead this year, more than triple the annual mortality average of 3.8 in Canada and the U.S.

Some of the whales have apparently died due to ship strikes or fishing gear entanglement.

No more than 500 still exist in the wild, prompting conservation groups and marine scientists to warn that the survival of the North Atlantic right whale is at imminent risk of extinction.

The whales, which summer off New England and Atlantic Canada, are among the most imperilled marine mammals on Earth. Populations have only slightly rebounded from the whaling era, when the blubber-rich baleen whale nearly became extinct.