The number of whales getting tangled up in fishing nets, line, buoys and other miscellaneous rope off the coasts of the United States hit a record high in 2024, with California taking the ignominious lead.
According to the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, there were 95 confirmed entangled whales in U.S. waters last year. Eighty-seven were live animals, while reports for eight came in after the animals had died.
On average, 71 whales are reported entangled each year. There were 64 in 2023.
More than 70% of the reports were from the coastal waters off California, Alaska, Hawaii and Massachusetts. California accounted for 25% in 2024, most in the San Francisco and Monterey bay areas.
Humpback whales were hardest hit, accounting for 77 of the cases. Other whale species include North Pacific gray whales, the North Atlantic right whale, minke, sperm, fin and bowhead whales.
Entanglements are just one of many threats facing whales worldwide. Earlier this year, 21 gray whales died in Bay Area waters, mostly after getting struck by ships. The animals are increasingly stressed from changes in food availability, shipping traffic, noise pollution, waste discharge, disease and plastic debris, and their ability to avoid and survive these impediments is diminishing.
Since 2007, more than 920 humpback whales have been maimed or killed by long line ropes that commercial crabbers use to haul up cages from the sea floor. The report notes that about half the incidents are directly tied to commercial and recreational fishing lines. The remaining 49 also involved line and buoys but in circumstances that could not be traced back to a specific fishery.
The report comes after years of government and conservation group efforts with the commercial fishing industry to increase awareness and encourage different fishing technologies — such as pop-up fishing gear, which uses a remote-controlled pop-up balloon device to bring cages to the surface, rather than relying on lines.
It also comes as funding for NOAA is threatened and Congress is considering draft legislation that would weaken the Marine Mammal Protection Act, one of the country’s foundational environmental laws, signed by President Nixon in 1972.
“This report paints a clear picture: our current safeguards are not enough,” said Gib Brogan, campaign director for Oceana, an ocean advocacy group, in a statement.
He said things are likely to get worse if NOAA’s funding is cut and the Marine Mammal Protection Act is eroded.
“These findings underscore an urgent need for coordinated action,” said Kathi George, the Sausalito-based Marine Mammal Center’s director of cetacean conservation in a statement. “Together, we can apply the best available science to reduce the risk of entanglement, through strategies like supporting fisher-led initiatives, improving detection and response efforts, and enhancing reporting and data sharing.”
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