One can’t help but feel some concern about data from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration about increased entanglements affecting humpback whales here. Also, NOAA researchers have documented a decline in visits from the whales to Hawaiian waters.

Nobody has established a cause for the drop in whale sightings, and more study is underway. Still, the trend certainly suggests the need for caution in the evaluation of proposed Navy training exercises involving explosives and sonar. We need to know how the creatures are faring down there, beneath the waves.