Washington cancels new protection for whales
The Trump administration on Monday threw out a new rule intended to limit the number of endangered whales and sea turtles caught in fishing nets off the West Coast, saying existing protections were already working.
Economically, the rule would have had “a much more substantial impact on the fleet than we originally realized,” said Michael Milstein, a spokesman with the National Marine Fisheries Service, which killed the rule.
The rule would have applied to fewer than 20 fishing vessels that use mile-long fishing nets to catch swordfish off California and Oregon, shutting down the drift gillnet fishing for swordfish for up to two seasons if too many of nine groups of whales, sea turtles or dolphins were caught in the nets.
The Pacific Fishery Management Council, which includes representatives of the fishing industry as well as state and tribal governments and federal regulators, proposed the rule in 2015.
But the fisheries service said that safety measures already taken by the fishing industry, such as pinging warning devices on the nets that can be heard by some of the animals, were drastically cutting the numbers of whales and turtles becoming tangled in the nets, Milstein said.
“The bottom line is this is a fishery that’s worked hard to reduce its impact,” Milstein said.
Environmental groups protested Monday’s decision.
Catherine Kilduff, an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity environmental group, said any accidental harm to endangered populations of humpback whales and leatherback turtles would be particularly dangerous given their low numbers — as low as 411 for one group of humpbacks.
“If they catch one, it’s a huge problem for the population,” Kilduff said.
The rule would have applied to endangered fin, humpback and sperm whales, short-fin pilot whales, common bottlenose dolphins, and endangered leatherback, loggerhead, olive-ridley and green sea turtles.