Two environmental organizations, the Center for Biological Diversity and Friends of the Earth, announced plans to sue the federal government for failing to protect whales off the coast of California from fatal ship strikes.
They sent a notice to the Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Coast Guard accusing these agencies, alongside the National Marine Fisheries Service, of neglecting to address how designated shipping lanes contribute to collisions with whales and sea turtles.
Driving the news: In 2025 alone, at least eight gray whales have died from suspected ship strikes in the San Francisco Bay Area, indicating an alarming trend of whale mortality linked to shipping traffic.
- Ship strikes are identified as a leading cause of death for several whale species frequenting California waters, including gray, bluefin, and humpback whales.
- Experts and environmental groups note that the observed number of ship strikes likely underestimate actual deaths, as whales often sink after collisions. One study estimates that about 80 whales die annually from ship strikes off the California coast.
- This is not the first legal challenge: in December 2022, a federal judge ruled in favor of these organizations in a prior case targeting the government’s failure to protect endangered whales from vessel collisions in major port areas like Los Angeles, Long Beach, and San Francisco Bay.
Go deeper: A central issue in the potential new lawsuit concerns federally designated shipping lanes that intersect critical whale habitats, such as the Santa Barbara Channel and the northern approach to the San Francisco Bay.
- Though the National Marine Fisheries Service’s 2017 biological opinion concluded these shipping lanes would not result in harm (“no take”) to whales or turtles, the 2022 court ruling invalidated this finding as illogical and unsupported by evidence.
- The court highlighted that whale deaths occurring within those lanes remain undisputed, rejecting the government’s previous assurances.
- Despite the court decision, the environmental groups argue that the responsible agencies have yet to develop a new biological opinion or evaluate alternative measures to reduce ship strikes.
