MAINE PUBLIC • February 6, 2020
Maine's congressional delegation is trying to up the pressure on federal fisheries regulators to look beyond the state's lobster industry when seeking to reduce threats to the endangered North Atlantic right whale. In a letter to top officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) this week, the delegation calls on the agency to provide more information about reducing the risk of ship strikes off the United States and Canada - strikes that they say are as much a threat to the whales' survival as entanglement with lobster fishing gear.