This issue is the latest Navy Environmental Impact Statement Supplement that needs citizen input before Feb 2. They did not choose to hold meetings on the Olympic Peninsula to take public input on this supplemental update.
The Navy conducts training and testing in a stretch of the Pacific roughly the size of Montana. It wants to continue and expand its activities in these waters off the West Coast from Washington to Northern California. But first, the Navy must renew its permit under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The plan calls for detonating explosives, moving vessels, and deploying 700 more sonobuoys per year. And that’s drawing criticism from environmentalists who say the increased use of sonar poses increased risk for whales and other marine mammals. Sonobouys are three-feet-long cylindrical floats are dropped from aircraft into the water. They use active sonar for the audible clues that can help them locate enemy submarines. Ashley Ahearn reports. (EarthFix)
http://earthfix.info/news/article/will-sonobuoys-in-the-pacific-help-the-navy-but-harm-whales/
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound |
For details on what sonar means, see War of the Whales, by Josh Horowitz.