Lawsuit Filed Over Southern Resident Killer Whale Protection

SEATTLE, WA - A nonprofit group is suing the federal government to expand protected habitat in the Pacific Ocean for Southern Resident killer whales. The population of the Southern Resident group has dropped to an extreme low, and a calf born to J35, a member of the group, died in late July.

The Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) filed the suit Thursday against the National Marine Fisheries Service, a division of the U.S. Department of Commerce. The suit demands that the federal government expand protected habitat along the Pacific Coast from British Colombia to San Francisco, where the Southern Resident whales spend winter.

The CBD petitioned the federal government for the expansion beginning in 2014. The fisheries service in 2015 agreed that an expansion of the protected habitat was warranted, but has so far failed to do anything about it, according to the lawsuit.

Only Puget Sound and the Salish Sea are federally protected habitat for the Southern Resident whales.

The Southern Resident whales are close to extinction, the lawsuit claims. An annual census of the group by the Center for Whale Research counted 75 orcas in 2017 - a 30-year low. The group of whales has not had a successful birth in two years, which whale researchers have called a "dead baby boom."

J35, a member of the Southern Resident group, carried her dead calf for 17 days straight recently. The calf died a day after it was born in late July. Images of J35's mourning were seen around the world.

Here's the full lawsuit CBD filed against the fisheries service:

Orca Lawsuit by Neal McNamara on Scribd