The Twelve Dead Whales of December

Whales continue to wash up on East Coast beaches while officials and the media refuse to make any connection with the disruptive and deafening activities of offshore wind.

A juvenile humpback whale washes ashore at Richmond Pond Beach in Westport, Mass. on New Year’s Day. Photo: Bill Thompson

December 2024 proved deadly for whales on the East Coast.

The month started with a minke whale that stranded alive in Cape May, New Jersey, and was euthanized by a veterinarian from the Brigantine-based Marine Mammal Stranding Center. Seven days later a dead humpback was spotted near Shark River Inlet, in Monmouth County.

Two humpbacks and a minke whale washed up dead on Cape Cod Bay beaches, with another minke spotted floating off of Block Island, Rhode Island.

The total casualty count for December from New England to New Jersey included not only a dozen whales, but an undetermined number of dolphins.

In 2017 the folks at NOAA Fisheries (part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) officially labeled these excessive whale deaths an “Unusual Mortality Event,” a phenomenon the agency says started in 2016. And that has become a convenient way for the media to dismiss any connection between marine mammal deaths and offshore wind.

For example, the NBC affiliate in Rhode Island when reporting on December's three dead whales in Cape Cod Bay stated, “There's speculation that offshore wind projects may be linked to the recent whale deaths. However, scientists have observed an unusually high number of deaths in minke, humpback, and endangered North Atlantic right whales since 2017, predating the commencement of offshore wind work.”

But that’s just not true.

2016 and 2017 were kick-off years for offshore wind “work” on the Atlantic coast. In 2016 Orsted (previously known as DONG Energy) received an “incidental harassment authorization” (IHA) from NOAA Fisheries to “take” over 700 marine mammals – whales included – during its acoustic high-resolution geophysical surveys off the coast of Massachusetts for the lease area called Bay State Wind. (Takes are defined as activities that “harass, hunt, capture, or kill, or attempt to harass, hunt, capture, or kill any marine mammal”).

In 2016 an IHA, or “take” was granted to do “wind farm cable installation” off Block Island.

In 2017 “takes” of marine mammals were granted for Ocean Wind offshore of New Jersey and Deepwater Wind LLC. The latter was authorization that included survey work off the coast of New York for lease 0CS-A 0486, now known as Revolution Wind, for potential submarine cable routes to make landfall in New York. It allowed for the “take” of an astonishing 14,000-plus marine mammals. That included official permission to “incidentally harass” 53 humpbacks, 73 fin whales, 15 minke whales, and a stunning 105 North Atlantic right whales representing almost a third of that species’ remaining population. The public knew so little about what was going on at the time that during the comment period for that notice in the Federal Register, only one “private citizen” responded.

(The original lease assignment for Revolution Wind goes back to Oct. 1, 2013)

Those years were just the beginning. Currently, there are 20 active harassment authorizations covering the coasts of New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia sanctioning “takes” of untold numbers of marine mammals.

Soon, there may be even more. A total of 32 wind energy leases have been issued by the U.S. government from Maine to North Carolina. Several are currently under active construction such as Vineyard Wind offshore of Martha’s Vineyard and Revolution Wind, off the coasts of Rhode Island and Massachusetts, which has completed the seabed installation of 52 massive steel cylinders called monopiles.

NOAA Fisheries has relegated the high number of whale strandings, such as this juvenile humpback that recently washed ashore in Westport, Mass., to an unresolved “Unusual Mortality Event.” Photo: Bill Thompson

Off the Virginia coast, they have already pounded 78 of the planned 176 two-thousand-ton monopiles into the sea floor. In other areas they are mapping the ocean floor with multi-beam echosounders, sparkers, boomers, and CHIRPs. (To hear what this sounds like underwater, you can listen to audio files here courtesy of acoustic expert Robert Rand).

NOAA Fisheries admits that this noise can harm the hearing of marine mammals or even deafen them, saying so in a recent 604-page biological opinion.

But December’s count is just a drop in the ocean.

According to NOAA Fisheries, the Unusual Mortality Event tally for minke whales along the Atlantic coast since 2017 is 193. For Humpbacks since 2016 there have been 232. The party line, of course, is to say there is “no evidence” linking any marine mammal deaths to offshore wind development. And NOAA is still busy determining its “next steps for the investigation.”

Meanwhile, on New Year's Day 2025, a dead juvenile humpback whale came in with the tide at Richmond Pond Beach in Westport, Mass., not too far from offshore construction that had just resumed at Vineyard Wind.