|
Environmentalists, Navy strike deal on
controversial sonar system
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - The Navy has agreed to limit
its peacetime use of a new sonar system designed to detect enemy submarines,
but which may also harm marine mammals and fish, according to an environmental
group that sued the military over the issue.
The Natural Resources Defense Council and the Navy reached a legal
settlement last week in which the military agrees to use the new system only in
specific areas along the eastern seaboard of Asia, according to documents
provided by the environmental group.
The agreement still must be approved by a federal magistrate to become
permanent, but if implemented the deal would greatly restrict the Navy's
original plan for the sonar system, which once was slated to be tested in most
of the world's oceans.
Navy officials familiar with the case could not immediately be reached
for comment.
Environmentalists say that sonar systems endanger marine mammals and
fish, especially whales. They point to a different system the Navy used in
2000, when at least 16 whales and two dolphins beached themselves on islands in
the Bahamas. Eight whales died and scientists found hemorrhaging around their
brains and ear bones, which could have been caused by exposure to loud noise.
Last year the Natural Resources Defense Council and other environmental
groups sued the Navy over the new system, seeking to restrict its use.
U.S. Magistrate Elizabeth Laporte later issued a preliminary injunction
restricting use of the system, and in a separate ruling ordered the
environmentalists and the Navy to negotiate a final settlement.
The new deal, which is the result of those negotiations, largely mirrors
the restrictions imposed by Laporte's earlier injunction. She must still
approve the settlement for it to become final.
Joel Reynolds, director of the Marine Mammal Protection Project at the
Natural Resources Defense Council, hailed the settlement as balancing the needs
of the environment and the Navy.
``This agreement safeguards both marine life and national security,''
Reynolds said in a statement. ``It will prevent the needless injury,
harassment, and death of countless whales, porpoises and fish, and yet allow
the Navy to do what is necessary to defend our country.''
In addition to restricting the system to the eastern seaboard of Asia,
the Navy also agreed to seasonal restrictions designed to protect whale
migrations, and to avoid using the system near the coast.
None of the restrictions applies during
time of war. |