Protecting whales from vessel collisions

Title: Building Neural Networks for Classification of Killer Whale Calls

Project partner: Simon Fraser University (Burnaby, BC)

Project summary: This two-year project will build upon existing artificial intelligence strategies and improve tools able to automatically detect Southern Resident killer whale calls and distinguish them from other underwater sounds, such as other whales species. This research will improve our ability to detect Southern Resident Killer Whales in near real-time and help us better understand how they are using their habitat.

Title: North Atlantic Right Whale Survey in Jacques Cartier Passage

Project partner: Mingan Island Cetacean Study (Longue-Pointe-de-Mingan, QC)

Project summary: This two-year project will support North Atlantic Right Whale vessel-based surveys from June to September 2018 and 2019 in the Jacques Cartier Passage, northwest of Anticosti Island, Quebec. Information on sightings, including photos, date, time, position and number of whales observed, will be uploaded on a daily basis onto WhaleMap. This interactive mapping tool, developed by Dalhousie University, displays recent known locations of North Atlantic Right Whales as they travel in Canadian waters.

Title: Utilizing sighting reports from a network of citizen scientists to reduce vessel disturbance and strike risk to Southern Resident Killer Whales and other cetaceans

Project partner: Ocean Wise Conservation Association (Vancouver, BC)

Project summary: This one-year project will support the expansion of the British Columbia Cetacean Sightings Network and the continued development and testing of their Whale Report Alert System, an online application that alerts specific groups, such as large commercial vessel operators, of the presence of whales in their vicinity. This awareness could help better enable vessels to undertake voluntary adaptive mitigation measures, such as slowing down or altering course, to reduce the risk of collision and disturbance.

Title: Developing a real-time forecasting system for Southern Resident Killer Whales

Project partner: Simon Fraser University (Burnaby, BC)

Project summary: This three-year project will support the development of a real-time Southern Resident Killer Whale (SRKW) movement forecast tool for ship alerting purposes. The project will use a marine animal movement model along with real-time and archival SRKW sightings and acoustic detections to provide an estimate of current SRKW pod locations and help predict their direction of movement.

Title: Development of vessel-based infra-red camera whale detection system for ship-strike mitigation

Project partner: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (Woods Hole, Massachusetts)

Project summary: This one-year project will support the development of a transportable and cost-effective vessel-based infrared camera whale detection system that could detect whale blows in near-real time, including those of the endangered North Atlantic Right Whale.

Title: Evaluation of the use of thermal imaging for whale detection in Canadian waters to study killer whale presence

Project partner: University of Erlangen–Nuremberg (Germany)

Project summary: This two year project will support the testing of two land-based infrared camera whale detection systems at Sturdies Bay ferry terminal in British Columbia. This project will test the feasibility of such systems to detect the presence of whales in BC waters in near-real time, including the Southern Resident Killer Whale.