The recent strike and killing of a pregnant fin whale by a cruise ship in the Gulf of Alaska tragically highlights decades of inaction by the federal government and shipping industry to enact reasonable measures to reduce this risk. Such whale protection measures include vessel speed reductions, or VSRs, to 10 knots or less and bow watches posted in designated whale habitat. A voluntary vessel speed reduction off California has reportedly reduced ship-whale strikes by half, while also reducing underwater noise, fuel use and harmful stack emissions.

While technological options to detect and avoid whales, such as thermal imaging infrared cameras, forward-looking sonar, sonic pingers and passive acoustic monitoring, are useful, the best way to reduce the risk of ship-whale strikes is slower speed and a posted bow watch.

Similar to speed limits for cars in school zones when children are present, ship speed reductions give both a ship crew and whales more time to detect each other and avoid a collision. They also reduce the risk of more serious or fatal injuries if a collision occurs.

We know that the number of whales actually observed killed by ships is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of total mortalities. To be detected, usually a struck whale must remain pinned across the bow of a ship and carried into port. Studies have estimated that whale mortalities unobserved offshore compared with those observed are anywhere from 7-to-1 to 25-to-1. Given the thousands of whales and ships overlapping in Alaska waters each year, it is more than likely that hundreds of whales have been struck and killed here.

It is important for the public to know the record of failure by government and industry to reduce this risk.

Beginning in 2009, I proposed to the incoming Obama administration that it enact greater protections for Unimak Pass in the eastern Aleutians and Bering Strait, including ship-whale strike reduction measures. I reiterated this specific ship-whale strike reduction request in 2013, 2018, 2021 and 2022. Each time, the federal administration declined to act.

Additionally, in 2022, I proposed directly to the Prince William Sound tanker owners that they enact voluntary speed reductions to reduce the risk of whale strikes. These huge oil tankers steam year-round directly across the paths of hundreds of whales. In June 2009, the Exxon tanker Kodiak entered Valdez with a dead humpback whale stuck on its bow.

I then proposed to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the PWS Regional Citizens Advisory Council that they press the tanker owners to adopt voluntary whale protection measures.

NOAA convened an informative technical workshop on the issue but declined to take any action, presenting a flawed assessment of the risk. In response to a formal scientific integrity complaint I filed with the agency, the NOAA National Appeals Office directed its Alaska staff to provide a supplemental assessment of the ship-whale strike risk in PWS that corrected some, but not all, of its previous flawed assessment. The agency continued to decline to take any action.

In July 2024, the PWSRCAC sent a letter to tanker owners asking them to consider adopting a speed reduction in PWS, which the tanker owners declined the following month, saying they would only “follow the guidance, direction, and regulations provided by NOAA/NMFS on this matter.”

In March 2023, two organizations I am associated with, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and The Ocean Foundation, submitted a proposed rulemaking to NOAA asking the agency to adopt a nationwide protocol to reduce whale strikes by ships

The petition proposes that the agency designate critical whale safety zones in all U.S. waters in which ships would be required to slow to 10 knots during the day, 8 knots in low visibility, such as nighttime, fog or heavy weather, and post bow watches to detect whales ahead. Neither the Biden nor the Trump administration responded to the petition, the latter saying earlier this year only that “NMFS is still considering the 2023 petition.”

After two suspected ship strikes on whales in Icy Strait in August 2024, I urged the Cruise Lines International Association with its 59 member companies, to adopt voluntary speed reductions and other whale-strike reduction measures in critical Alaska whale habitats. The cruise ship association ignored the request.

Again in February of this year, I urged the Cruise Lines International Association and NOAA to enter into a memorandum of agreement specifically to reduce the risk of whale strikes this summer in Alaska. In a Feb. 20 email, the cruise association responded: “In addition to specialized training for crew, cruise lines have agreed to the voluntary slowdown of vessels in sensitive areas or when marine life is observed/present. Cruise lines also use methods and technologies such as bow-positioned observers and online monitoring and reporting apps to carefully navigate in ways that are respectful and protective of marine mammals.”

When I pressed them for details on these vague, questionable assertions and reiterated our proposed memorandum of agreement between the Cruise Lines International Association and NOAA, the cruise association went silent. Later that month, NOAA’s Alaska regional director responded to the proposal: “Here in Alaska, we continue to engage with the cruise industry to reduce the risk of vessel strikes (e.g., encouraging the use of Whale Alert). Due to reduced capacity we’re quite limited in our ability to do more proactive work with the cruise industry at this time.”

After the fin whale was struck and killed by the Ovation of the Seas in the Gulf of Alaska last month, I again pressed NOAA and the Cruise Lines International Association to enter into a memorandum of agreement to reduce such risk, suggesting that important whale safety zones in Alaska waters that need strategic vessel speed reductions include at least Icy Strait, Prince William Sound, Resurrection Bay/Kenai Fjords, Unimak Pass and Bering Strait.

The cruise association has yet to respond, and NOAA’s regional director said simply that they are reviewing the situation and potential next steps.

Tragically, there is still no commitment by the shipping industry or government to address this issue in Alaska. While these same ship owners participate in voluntary whale-strike reduction measures elsewhere, they refuse to do so here in Alaska.

As these ship owners remain unwilling to remedy this voluntarily in Alaska, it is time that NOAA adopt our 2023 proposed rulemaking requiring them to reduce this risk to whales here in Alaska and across the nation.

Alaska whales, who share their ocean home with us terrestrial primates on ships, deserve nothing less.

Rick Steiner is a marine conservation biologist in Anchorage, former marine professor at the University of Alaska and board chair of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.

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