Navy Plans Underwater Weapons Tests

The United States Navy is planning a new round of sonar and weapons testing and training exercises in its Atlantic Training and Testing Study Area, which covers some 2.6 million nautical miles of inshore and offshore waters, extending from the coastline of New England to the Gulf of Mexico.

The exercises are scheduled to begin in November 2018; the Navy first needs to renew permits issued by the National Marine Fisheries Service under the Endangered Species and Marine Mammal Protection Acts, as its activities have been deemed potentially harmful to whales, dolphins, fish, birds, and sea turtles.

A public comment period extends through August, and several hearings are being held on the proposal, though none in the New York area. Comments may be submitted online at the project’s website, AFTTEIS.com, or by mail to the Naval Facilities Engineering Command Atlantic, Attention Code EV22KP (AFTT EIS Project Managers), 6506 Hampton Boulevard, Norfolk, Va. 23508-1278.

A draft environmental impact statement describing the project and its potential effects on ocean habitat, pelagic animals, vegetation, and other areas — including reports addressing marine mammal strandings associated with Navy sonar activities and an analysis of the acoustic impacts on marine mammals and sea turtles — is on the website.

  The document concludes that most environmental impacts, according to the Navy, would be short-term or minimal. The use of sonar and explosives could cause behavior changes, injury, or death in fish, marine mammals, birds, or sea turtles and other reptiles, the statement says. However, while individual animals may be affected, the analysis says that for the various species there is little potential for long-term or populationwide impacts.

In a fact sheet on sonar and marine mammals, the National Marine Fisheries Service describes how “most, if not all, marine animals rely to some extent on sound for a wide range of biological functions, including communication, navigation, foraging, and predator detection.”

In certain conditions, the fact sheet says, “mid-frequency military sonars may play a role in marine mammal strandings.” The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and partner agencies are trying to better understand the issues, according to the fact sheet, “and to identify the most effective way to mitigate adverse effects of active sonar operations while balancing important national security needs.”

The sonar systems used by the Navy to detect enemy submarines, a question-and-answer column in Scientific American magazine says, “generate slow-rolling sound waves topping out at around 235 decibels,” while the sound from loud rock bands tops out at 130 decibels. The sound waves travel underwater for hundreds of miles and retain high decibels as far as 300 miles from their source. There is evidence, according to the magazine, that, to avoid the sonar waves, whales will swim hundreds of miles, rapidly change their depth, causing physical harm to themselves, and beach themselves. In 2005, the article notes, 34 whales of three different species were stranded and died along the Outer Banks of North Carolina during Navy sonar training nearby.

The Natural Resources Defense Council successfully sued the Navy in 2003 to restrict the use of low-frequency sonar off the California coast. Two years later, after a coalition led by the council asked federal courts to further restrict more harmful, far-ranging sonar use off the Southern California coast, the Supreme Court ruled that the Navy should be allowed to continue the sonar testing, citing national security. In its legal brief, the coalition referred to Navy documents that estimated the sonar testing “would kill some 170,000 marine mammals and cause permanent injury to more than 500 whales, not to mention temporary deafness for at least 8,000 others,” Scientific American reported.

The exact locations and dates of the upcoming naval exercises have not been released. According to Navy documents, the activities are necessary to maintain military readiness, and may include testing torpedoes, unmanned vehicles, sonar systems, or “similar activities that are critical to the success of undersea warfare.”

Sonar, the Navy says, “is critical to the Navy’s ability to defend against adversary submarines and anti-ship mines,” and therefore “is necessary to conduct scientific research, evaluate new sonar systems, and maintain the operational capability of current systems.”  

There are more than 300 “extremely quiet modern submarines,” according to the Navy document, operated by more than 40 nations worldwide, making anti-submarine warfare training a top priority. “While simulators provide early skill repetition and enhance teamwork, there is no substitute for training in a realistic environment,” the Navy says.        

The Navy works with the fisheries service to “reduce the potential impacts of training and testing activities on the ocean environment,” and provides funds to research marine species physiology and behavior in an attempt to better understand and avoid the effects of its training and testing activities on the marine environment,” according to the agency’s environmental impact statement. It has taken a “proactive role” throughout the Atlantic testing area to protect the North Atlantic right whale, a highly endangered species, the Navy says.