Underwater Boom Boxes

By Philip Elmer-DeWitt

Think of them as a matched pair of undersea loudspeakers, one sunk off the coast of California near Big Sur, the other near the Hawaiian island of Kauai. A blast from one of these big woofers would be loud enough to be heard in the water for thousands of miles--and loud enough to damage or destroy the hearing of any animal that swam too close.

That's a problem for some marine biologists and a lot of whale lovers. Both groups came to Washington last week to speak out against an experiment involving the boom boxes. The $35 million project, set up by San Diego's Scripps Institution of Oceanography, is designed to find out whether the much / feared global warming is actually occurring. At regular intervals over a period of years, scientists will fire acoustic "shots" across the water and measure the time it takes them to span great stretches of the Pacific. Since sound moves faster in warm water than in cold, researchers will get an indirect indication of ocean temperature. The experiment will begin next month --if the government grants an exemption to a law protecting marine mammals from harassment.

The dispute pits environmentalists against one another: those who worry more about global warming vs. those who fret more about animal welfare. Lindy Weilgart, a Cornell University expert on whale acoustics, pointed out at hearings before the National Marine Fisheries Service that whales and other marine mammals rely on exquisitely sensitive hearing for hunting, navigating and socializing. Noise pollution from the experiment, she fears, could disrupt the mating and migration patterns of hundreds of thousands of animals. As Weilgart put it, "A deaf whale is a dead whale."

Proponents argued that few creatures would swim close enough to be deafened by the speakers, which will be anchored 3,000 ft. deep. Moreover, supporters said, the noise would be no louder than other sounds filling the sea, from the thunder of cracking polar ice to the roar of supertankers.

By week's end many marine biologists had been persuaded that the project was acceptable, and government approval seemed likely. The Scripps Institution, for its part, has set aside $2.9 million to study the experiment's effects on marine mammals and promises to pull the plug on the loudspeakers the minute the neighbors complain.

With reporting by Dan Cray/Los Angeles