Conservationists Sue to Sink Hawaii Swordfish Longliners

HONOLULU, Hawaii, September 1, 2004 (ENS) – Conservationists and native Hawaiians filed suit Monday in federal court in a bid to reverse the federal government’s decision to reopen the longline swordfish fishery based in the Hawaiian Islands. The plaintiffs say the decision violates federal wildlife laws and threatens imperiled birds and endangered leatherback and loggerhead sea turtles.

"The government is running blind when it comes to opening this fishery," said Todd Steiner, director of plaintiff Turtle Island Restoration Network. "Blind to rules and regulations, blind to the potential extinction of seabirds and sea turtles. And unless we truly and fairly examine the impact of the longline fishery, the only thing we will be seeing are empty oceans."

Miles of rope are used by fishermen for longline fishing (Photo by William Folsom courtesy NOAA)

A suit in 1999 by conservationists prompted a federal judge to close the fishery in 2000 after determining that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) had failed to consider the environmental impact of the practice.

Longliners cast up to 60 miles of fishing line at a time with as many as 8,000 hooks, many of which unintentionally capture and kill sea turtles – and other species - instead of their intended targets of fish.

In 1999, the Hawaii based longline fishery consisted of 120 boats, setting some 20 million hooks annually.

In 2001, the federal agency reviewed the impact of the fishery on marine life, concluded that it was illegally harming endangered sea turtles and announced a formal decision to close the fishery a year later.

Longliners were allowed to continue targeting for tuna under stricter regulations – tuna longlining results in less turtle bycatch than swordfish longlining.

NMFS reversed the swordfish fishery decision last April, but did impose some new restrictions on the longliners targeting swordfish.

Federal observer measures a tuna on a longline fishing vessel based in Hawaii. (Photo courtesy NOAA)

The longliners must now use circle hooks with inwardly curved points that are less likely to catch turtles.

When the decision was announced, officials said they were also hopeful that new fishing technologies developed by the federal government and commercial longline fishers could ultimately reduce accidental catch of loggerhead and leatherback turtles by as much as 90 percent.

But the plaintiffs say the endangered turtles are in such peril that reopening the fishery, even with restrictions and hopes for the new gear, is not justified.

In March a coalition of conservationists and scientists warned that leatherback and loggerhead turtles could be extinct within 30 years unless an international moratorium on longlining is enacted.

Conservationists estimate as many as 40,000 sea turtles are killed as bycatch by the global longline fishing industry each year, and some scientists fear that commercial longlining as practiced today also threatens to wipe out whales, dolphins, sharks, sea birds and other marine species.

But the situation is most desperate for the leatherback sea turtle, a species that has been swimming the oceans for more than 100 million years.

Fewer than 3,000 reproductive females remain and recent scientific studies indicate the incidental killing of the species must be reduced to zero for it to survive.

Endangered green sea turtle rests on the sand of a Hawaiian island. (Photo courtesy Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center)

The lawsuit contends that the federal government at the very least must follow the law.

The groups allege the decision to reopen the Hawaii longline swordfish fishery violated the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the Endangered Species Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).

The plaintiffs have filed a motion for a preliminary injunction, asking the court keep the swordfish fishery closed until their challenge is heard.

In addition to causing the deaths of endangered sea turtles protected by the Endangered Species Act, the plaintiffs say the fishery will kill black-footed albatross and Laysan albatross, both protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and was reopened without a proper Environmental Impact Statement, in violation of NEPA.

Prior to its closure, the swordfish fishery was also responsible for the deaths of thousands of black-footed and Laysan albatross every year - both seabird species breed almost exclusively in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands.

The birds dive on the baited longline hooks, are snagged and then drowned.

The Migratory Bird Treaty Act strictly prohibits capturing or killing migratory birds such as albatross "by any means or in any manner" without permission from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The plaintiffs say the agency has not authorized the deaths of any black-footed or Laysan albatross by the longliners and caution that both species need protection.

All albatross species are at risk of longliners, even this short-tailed albatross family in Alaska. (Photo by Hiroshi Hasegawa courtesy NMFS)

And last year the IUCN-World Conservation Union reclassified the black-footed albatross from "vulnerable" to "endangered" due to longline impacts and projected a future decline of more than 60 percent if longline fishing in the north Pacific is not reduced.

"NMFS has failed, time and again, to responsibly manage this fishery in accordance with its legal obligations," said Paul Achitoff an attorney with the environmental law firm Earthjustice, which is representing the plaintiffs in the suit.

"Time and again, NMFS has turned its back on protected species, the health of the oceans, and our legacy to future generations, and instead kowtows to the longline industry's demands for more fishing at any cost. We will not stand by and watch."

The suit was filed by the Center for Biological Diversity, Ka `Iwa Kua Lele, and Turtle Island Restoration Network.

The case appears similar to one that forced the federal government last March to ban commercial longline fishing for swordfish for a large area of the Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and the West Coast.

That decision came in response to a federal appellate court ruling that found the National Marine Fisheries Service violated the Endangered Species Act by failing to analyze the impacts of the California longline swordfish fishery on endangered sea turtles and sea birds.