America’s Newly Discovered Whale Is Already in Trouble

Often when we hear of a new species, it's something petite, fast-moving…easy to miss as it scurries across the forest floor or hides out in caves. A tiny gecko in Madagascar, a tropical sunbird in Indonesia, deep-sea octopuses off the shores of Costa Rica.

But every once in a while, that new species might in fact be a giant in our midst-one that weighs as much as four T. rexesand lives in our literal backyard.

Indeed, it was just three years ago when scientists confirmed that the Gulf of Mexico served as a full-time home for a unique species of whale: the Rice's whale. They quickly assessed that the population was in trouble: According to estimates, merely 51 of these under-the-radar (and very demure) marine mammals remained.

The unusual finding bolstered the case of marine mammal advocates from NRDC and other groups who'd been asking the federal government to protect the population for close to a decade. In 2014, NRDC petitioned the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to list the whale as endangered-protections were finally granted in 2019-but the Gulf has remained an exceedingly dangerous place for sea life.

Now, the fight to save what's leftof the Rice's whale population has entered a new, and increasingly urgent, phase. And an upcoming decision from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on a critical habitat designation could be a game changer.

How the Rice's whale hid in plain sight

The existence of a Gulf of Mexico whale was not unknown to scientists. But their categorization of the creature was misunderstood.

You see, it was once thought that this group of whales belonged to another species, known as Bryde's whales (pronounced "broodus"). "For all intents and purposes, they look very similar," says Matthew Leslie, a biologist at Ursinus College outside of Philadelphia. "But once we dug down into the genetics, they started to look really different."

So far as scientists can tell, Rice's whales (Balaenoptera ricei) swam into the Gulf of Mexico about three million years ago, when the land bridge between North and South America had not yet fully formed. After that barrier closed the passage, however, the whales seem to simply have stayed put, feasting on small fish and squid. As the only baleen whales living in the region year-round, they had the ocean's bounty mainly to themselves.

The trouble is that this gigantic warm water basin is now a very different place than the one these animals evolved to live in. Logbooks from whaling vessels suggest that this species may have been hunted historically, perhaps as early as the 1700s. But it's modern times that have pushed the species to the brink of extinction.

These days, Rice's whales must contend with a daily onslaught of noise that the industry produces as it searches for the next big fossil fuel deposit. There is also a nonstop parade of vessels, which sometimes slice across the whales' backs as they rest at the surface. Heavy levels of pollution remain an ever-present risk, as do the threats that come with small population sizes and reduced genetic diversity.

But advocates believe these whales still have a shot. "Firstly, we know what the threats are," says Leslie. "And I would say the second source of hope is the fact that we've got really great examples where, if we address the issues and modify human behavior to leave these animals alone and let them do what they do, we've seen many examples of whales not only surviving but recovering."

The "sacrifice zone": What industry is doing to Rice's whale habitat

Some 3,500 oil and gas structuresdot the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, probing deep into the ocean floor. To locate reserves, the industry conducts seismic blasting using airguns, which echoes for miles through the waters. What flows out eventually makes its way into a network of pipelines-or, way more often than the industry would care to admit, spreads into the habitats of marine mammals, turtles, and fish.

Wildlife populations and fishing communities alike are still reelingfrom one of the most infamous oil spill disasters along the Gulf Coast, the Deepwater Horizon. That was the offshore oil rig operated by BP that exploded, caught fire, and then continued to spew about 200 million gallonsof crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico over the course of 87 days back in 2010. Eleven people died in the blast, and the pollution seeping out of the ocean floor would go on to kill an enormous number of wildlife-including an estimated 17 percent of the Rice's whale population.

Learn More: Harms to Our Oceans

Of course, there have been many other offshore drilling-related gas leaks and oil spills, both in more recent history and farther back. "The Gulf of Mexico has been heavily industrialized for decades now," says Michael Jasny, director of the NRDC Marine Mammal Protection Project. "It has been considered as something of a sacrifice zone for the oil and gas industry."

Beyond the industry's physical pollution, its noise pollution is also a grave threat to the Gulf's resident whales-in particular, the clamor from those high-volume, high-intensity airguns used for prospecting. As Jasny describes it, the machinery "puts out noise on par with explosives about every 10 to 12 seconds, day and night, for months at a time."

Using figures included in the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service's recent rulemaking under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, NRDC's most conservative estimate shows that the agency is allowing more than eight million blasts each year.

The result can trigger stress responses in whales, affecting their health. It can also lead to hearing loss, which weakens the whales' communication abilities, hunting skills, and abilities to avoid predators. NRDC and its partners brought these concerns to the federal government in 2021, through a lawsuitchallenging NMFS's lax regulation of seismic testing. (The agency later admitted that its seismic rule was based on an error that grossly underestimated the number of marine mammal deaths that could occur, and it committed to a do-over. In its new rule, issued this spring, the agency claims to be in compliance with the Marine Mammal Protection Act.)

Solutions to many of these whale threats are out there for the taking: Technology already exists that can dampen the effects of these blasts, says Jasny. Yet without an industry-wide mandate from the federal government, only about 10 percent of oil and gas companies are making an attempt to use any of it.

"The continued production of oil and gas in the Gulf of Mexico is inimical to the survival of this species," he says. And given the ramificationsfor our climate and health, he adds, "it also happens to be inimical to the survival of the human species."

Currently, advocates are keeping a close eye on a recent ruling by a federal courtthat could shut down industry activity as soon as December while the NMFS rewrites an opinion on the environmental impact of oil and gas drilling in the Gulf.

And as NRDC and partners continue to push for a complete moratorium on oil and gas leases across the region, Jasny notes that a more modest plan could bring some relief for local wildlife. At the minimum, preventing new leases in and around the Rice's whale's known habitat-which follows a thin crescent of continental shelf that runs from Florida to Texas-would be a good place to start.

A crosswalk for whales

The thin crescent is a bustling place-the port of Houston, for instance, exports more tons of cargo than any other port in the United States. And many of those vessels plow straight through Rice's whale habitat at dangerous speeds, as an NPR special investigation recently revealed.

NRDC

This is a particular problem at night, when Rice's whales come up to the surface to rest, and when they are nearly impossible to spot. Unfortunately, this natural behavior also brings the mammals within striking distance.

Since 2009, at least one Rice's whale has been killed and another severely injured as a result of vessel strikes. According to experts, the individual that survived struggles to dive as a result of the traumatic injuries it suffered to its spine.

With so few animals left in existence, advocates say it's imperative to make sure that no more Rice's whales meet the same fate. In fact, some estimates suggest that losing just one Rice's whale every 15 yearsis unsustainable.

That's why NRDC, the New England Aquarium, and various other partners came together to propose that NOAA implement a speed limit across the Rice's whales' sliver of ocean. It's not a novel approach; the government has already successfully imposed the same for North Atlantic right whales.

"You know, this is like a crosswalk, right?" says Leslie. "We have school zones for a reason. If we have a vulnerable section of our population, we reduce the speed. And that helps them get out of the way."

Lower speeds would also reduce noise impacts. And yet NOAA ultimately denied the request last fall. (The coalition also suggested reductions in nighttime travel across the whales' range.)

"It's just a no-brainer, in my opinion," says Leslie.

What's next for Rice's whales?

Typically, a classification on the endangered species list-as was granted in 2019 to the Rice's whale-yields a number of federal protections. However, these mammals have yet to see many of the benefits.

To put it succinctly, you can't save a species if it has nowhere to live. And that's what makes declaring a critical habitatfor Rice's whales so important.

By drawing a line around the whale's range, the government would be focusing conservation effort where it is needed the most. While the actual protections would need to be ironed out, according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, federal agencies are required to avoid "destruction" or "adverse modification" of any designated critical habitat.

What's interesting is that almost the entirety of the whale's known habitat lies within the United States' exclusive economic zone. Which means, in a very real sense, the fate of the species is ours to decide.

"I think that actually puts a lot of onus on us, as U.S. citizens, and as a country, to step up and say, 'We've got these laws that are more than 50 years old that protect these animals,'" says Leslie, referring to the Endangered Species Act. "Can we make good on these laws and come through with solid protection?"

The NOAA's decision on the critical habitat designation for Rice's whales is expected in early December, says Jasny.

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