Whale Atlas: A Mariners Guide to Whale Safer Shipping

A whale swimming past a shipping vessel. Photo Credit: Adam Ernster

I love the saying that we know more about outer space than we do about our oceans. I know I’m biased, since I decided to make a career out of marine conservation, but I think what we discover about our oceans is infinitely cooler. 

While I’m a native Californian, I’ve lived in many places throughout the US, and seeing the various relationships that each community has with the sea has been beautiful. Our dependence on the ocean for livelihoods, recreation, and mental health can unite even the most different types of folks. 

I started working in conservation through seasonal or short-term field work positions. I discovered a whole other part of California when I started doing fisheries surveys, walking the beaches up into the canyons of the Santa Monica Mountains, looking for steelhead trout and assessing habitat quality to ensure they had a place to thrive if they were there. I got to call the US Virgin Islands home while I trudged along the sand under the moon and stars, tagging nesting sea turtles to monitor their endangered population and reproductive success. I loved being in the field and having this intimate relationship with the species I was studying, but as I progressed in my career, I realized how important it was to make sure the data we collected was made known. 

What gets put on data sheets doesn't always translate in a meaningful way to the general public. And we want people to know what we are finding! That includes other scientists, but also policymakers, the community that lives in the area, and even the general public, regardless of where they live. Collecting the data is just the first part of the equation. Conservation really starts when the data gets into the right hands of people who can make meaningful decisions and changes to protect the species and the habitats involved.

I’m a data person. My data analysis of choice is Geographic Information Systems (GIS), which means I show the ‘where’ and how things are changing or overlapping across time. I turn things into maps that make information easier for people to understand and easier to disseminate. For CMSF, I put those skills to use with our whale conservation team. A major goal of the work that we do, specifically with the Protecting Blue Whales and Blue Skies Program (BWBS), is to increase awareness of ways that mariners can reduce their impact on coastal environments and large whale populations that are vulnerable to ship strikes. 

In many places throughout the world, high-traffic shipping zones overlap with important marine mammal habitat, including foraging areas and migration routes. Globally, the top two leading causes of mortality to whales are collisions with large vessels, known as ship strikes, and entanglements. BWBS aims to reduce the risk of ship strikes by slowing ships down or asking them to avoid certain areas. For the past 10 years, BWBS has engaged shipping companies, asking them to reduce their speeds voluntarily to a whale-safer level of 10 knots or less in accordance with NOAA voluntary Vessel Speed Reduction (VSR) requests issued annually off the coast of California. Where and when vessels slow down is just as important as the slowing down itself. We use the best available science, along with coordination from multiple state and federal agencies, to determine the placement and timing of VSR zones, and we are not the only ones that do this. 

The front page of the World Shipping Council Whale Chart.

Programs and measures like BWBS, centered on reducing shipping impacts on whales, exist in other areas of the US as well as many other countries throughout the world. In 2023, to raise awareness among mariners on opportunities to reduce biodiversity impacts, the World Shipping Council released a Whale Chart Report that compiled and outlined whale protection measures across our global oceans. This included VSR zones, Areas to be Avoided (ATBAs), and Traffic Separation Schemes (TSSs), all aimed at directing vessel traffic to either reduce speeds within or stay away from critical whale habitat areas.

Seeing an opportunity to make the static information included in the Whale Chart Report more interactive and user-friendly, our team has taken a leap forward on this concept to create a map platform that helps mariners access this information when planning multinational transits. 

CMSF is proud to introduce “Whale Atlas: A Mariners Guide to Whale-Safer Shipping” 

This brand-new, first-of-its-kind online map portal showcases digitized whale conservation zones relevant to maritime shipping activities. It houses information on a zone’s designation and parameters, including which species it protects, the seasonality of the protections, as well as the specifics of the measures. Some zones represent areas where mariners are requested to reduce speeds. Others direct ships to avoid important habitats. Some restrictions are only in effect for a few months each year, while others are active year-round. Whale Atlas provides this information, as well as the source/administering agency, so mariners can zoom in and out of relevant geographies, learn about opportunities to operate sustainably, and incorporate measures into their transit plans.

A preview of Whale Atlas's interface, by Danielle Alvarez.

Whale Atlas is an all-in-one resource to showcase whale protection zones enacted throughout the world, as well as make all mapped areas available for download! Maritime shipping is a global industry, and Whale Atlas brings us one step closer to ensuring that mariners consider whale-friendly shipping practices on the same global scale. 

The finishing touches are being put on Whale Atlas, and it is expected to be released later this summer, 2025. Stay tuned for the announcement about the official launch!