Sea trials of new acoustic deterrent device to keep orcas at bay

It's late here, and I'm tired, so I'm not sure quite how to phrase a comment on this other than to say that this sounds extremely immoral. We already cause enough noise pollution in the seas. To deliberately create it and to cause deliberate discomfort to intelligent creatures, just seems wrong to me.

> The Targeted Acoustic Startle Technology – known as TAST – is designed to trigger the instinctive startle reflex most animals have when they hear a particular sound.

It doesn't just cause discomfort, but it's intended to trigger an innate flight response and the associated anxiety to it.

It's not just discomfort, these are social animals, and we're doing the equivalent of putting on a constant fire alarm to disrupt their daily lives and their intra-species interaction.

Boats are already loud and extremely disruptive to ecosystems, probably why sea critters are pissed off enough to attack smaller boats in the first place. Cargo ships are already unfathomably loud at 190 decibels, which is comparable to a rocket launch and would rupture human ear drums.

https://www.nrdc.org/bio/regan-nelson/why-all-concern-about-...

Orcas can’t be present at UN meetings to peacefully lobby for the protection of their homes, so they formed a navy instead.

>An 85% reduction in orca sightings on the fishing grounds during playback of the audio signals compared to before playback.

>No harm to orca from the sound

Interesting that removing their choice of when and where to eat isn’t considered harm…

I imagine that once these get used in yachts for a while the pods will stop being familiar with attacking. It seems the end game customer of this is the fishing industry. Maybe it’s helpful because it will keep whales away from nets. But there appears to be a massive potential for incentivized over use here with no one the wiser… until 20 years later when we’re asking why whale sightings are declining.