PBS - The Voyage of the Odyssey - Track the Voyage - ATLANTIC OCEAN
Natacha Aguilar De Soto -
"The last one (stranding) was in July 2004 and the anti-submarine sonars were used more than 100 miles from the archipelago and still there were four beaked whales drove ashore, which means probably there were many more that never made it. The one before that was in 2002 and there were 14 beaked whales that were killed by the military sonar. The problem is that even if there are some resolutions from the European parliament about sonars in Europe and that there should be a moratorium on the use of these tactical sonars until the impact on the marine fauna has been established. Still the military not only of Spain but also NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) doesn't really want to apply that, so we have a problem because Canary Islands seems to be a very important area for beaked whales.
We have discovered probably one of the more dense populations of beaked whales known in the world near the coast. So it is a high-risk area and it is a very sensitive place for acoustic pollution."
Cuvier's beaked whale
Photo by Marta Guerra, La Laguna University: Tenerife, Canary Islands
Genevieve Johnson -
In 2004, at the ACCOBAMS (
The Agreement of Conservation of Cetaceans of the Black Sea, Mediterranean Sea and Contiguous Atlantic Area
) second meeting of the parties in Palma De Majorca, the Spanish government announced a ban of naval sonar use in the territorial waters around the Canary Islands. Unfortunately, this only restricts testing within 12 nautical miles of land and will have little effect in reducing the impact on beaked whales.
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