Whale Alert: the app preventing vessel strikes

Seasonal Management Areas (SMAs) are areas where NOAA requires vessels 65 feet in length or greater to travel at speeds of less than or equal to 10 knots. SMAs along the eastern seaboard of the US will appear as orange-coloured displays. If a boat enters an active SMA, a pop-up will appear stating that the vessel should be traveling at the regulated speed.

Dynamic Management Areas (DMAs) use sightings of multiple whales to trigger temporary, voluntary speed restrictions or advisory notices. DMAs will appear during designated time periods. A pop-up alert providing explanatory details is displayed when entering DMAs. Voluntary Slow Zones are also displayed.

Voluntary Areas to be Avoided (ATBA) are areas in key right whale habitats in US and Canadian waters that have been established for ships weighing 300 gross tons or greater.

Recommended Routes (RR) are paths produced by NOAA (and shown in the app) to help guide vessels through densely populated whale areas.

Whale Alert includes National Marine Sanctuaries and other Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) that heavily regulate fishing or other vessel activities. You can tap on an area to learn more about what is regulated.

The bright colours (blue and red) correspond to the type and level of protection for marine life. To learn more about this important resource visit our partner ProtectedSeas who maintains these maps.

Whale Alert uses a state-of-the-art acoustic detection system to warn mariners of the presence of endangered North Atlantic right whales in shipping lanes leading through NOAA’s Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary and to and from Boston, Massachusetts. The system is based on buoys that use hydrophones, special software, and satellite communication to identify right whale calls and automatically relay information to mariners.

Within the app, yellow whale tails indicate that a right whale has been detected within the past 24 hours and that NOAA recommends a speed of 10 knots or less through the area during that time period.

NOAA's Mandatory Ship Reporting (MSR) requires commercial ships weighing 300 gross tons and greater to report in when entering designated right whale reporting areas along the US Atlantic Coast. When a ship enters an MSR area, a pop-up display will provide information on reporting procedures and remind the mariner to report to the US Coast Guard.

Whale Alert greatly simplifies the process by including the MSR notice directly within the app.

Another feature specifically designed to help vessel operators is the inclusion of Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System (PORTS®) tide and weather data supplied by NOAA.

Where available, PORTS® adds an important situational awareness feature that helps large vessel operators navigate a host of environmental conditions affecting their ability to act on whale protection measures.

Everyone! Whale Alert is free and designed to be used by anyone with access to download the app. Sightings can be logged by recreational boaters, whale watchers, ferry captains, cruise ship passengers, sailors, land-based observers, fishermen, dock workers—if you can see a whale, you can add your sighting in Whale Alert!

If you're not already convinced, you should use Whale Alert because it is an invaluable tool for protecting whales—one that you can contribute to regardless of training or prior knowledge. Sightings that you log in Whale Alert are sent to a database used to establish management areas. Providing your sightings shows biologists and resource managers where the whales actually are, so they can in turn determine the best areas for vessels to slow down. Over time, this data can be used to determine whale migration patterns, so more permanent measures can be taken to protect whales from vessel strikes in heavy traffic areas.

Whale Alert is not only a tool for protecting whales, but it is also a convenient tool for mariners to get near real-time updates on management measures, reporting requirements, and oceanographic conditions. We simplify the actions that you have to take in response to a whale sighting or entry to a management zone. 

We've designed Whale Alert specifically with mariners in mind, and are open to comments on ways to improve the app for your use on the water! Contact us at info@whalealert.org.

Whale Alert isn't the only sightings platform developed to protect marine mammals. We contribute sightings to a number of other platforms, including: 

• NOAA Right Whale Database, which shares sightings with Whale Map ​
• St. Lawrence Global Observatory 
• Point Blue Conservation through Whale Alert West Coast and NOAA partners
• Acartia Collective in the Puget Sound Region 
• Whale Report & Alert System 
• Whale Safe 7

Future connections with new platforms in Europe:

• Orca
• ObsEnMer, managed by the GECC
• WhaleTrack, managed by Hebridean Whale & Dolphin Trust (HWDT)
• Irish Whale and Dolphin Group (IWDG)

Logging a sighting on Whale Alert will provide data for use by other platforms and initiatives. After all, we all have the same goal—to save whales!

You can still use the app and record your sighting without signal; the data will load and be shared with other users once you get signal back.

The displays of whale sightings are not instantaneous; it takes hours to days (depending on your status—it is quicker if you are a trusted observer) to load data about the presence of whales. So, Whale Alert doesn’t enable hopeful whale watchers to locate a specific whale and wouldn’t create disturbance.

NOAA Stellwagen National Marine Sanctuary was the originating sanctuary of the Whale Alert project. It uniquely leverages acoustic technology to help detect the presence of right whales in the Boston Channel and uses the Whale Alert platform to alert commercial shippers.

The sanctuary hosts some of the largest aggregations of endangered whales to occur along the eastern seaboard of the US.

This collaboration includes the five national marine sanctuaries of the West Coast, Conserve.IO, and Point Blue Conservation Science, in coordination with IFAW, with a mission to reduce the number of ship collisions with whales. West Coast national marine sanctuaries encompass 12,843 square miles of marine protected areas around the Channel Islands, Cordell Bank, Gulf of the Farallones, Monterey Bay, and Olympic Coast. Sanctuaries use a multi-pronged approach to reduce the risk of vessel strikes and have committed to activities in research and monitoring, policy and management collaborations, and education and outreach. To learn about new and continuing initiatives led by West Coast sanctuaries and partners, visit the sanctuary website dedicated to reducing ship strike risk to whales. Sanctuaries host numerous threatened and endangered whale species such as blue, humpback, fin, sperm, and western North Pacific grey whales, among others. These migratory whales rely on the highly productive waters located in the West Coast sanctuaries supplied by the California Current System.

The North Atlantic Right Whale Sighting Survey (NARWSS) is a NOAA Fisheries programme that locates and records the seasonal distribution of North Atlantic right whales off the Northeast US. Surveys are conducted year-round aboard a NOAA Twin Otter aircraft that flies systematic track lines within eleven primary survey blocks including Cashes Ledge, Franklin Basin, Georges Basin, Georges Shoal, Great South Channel (SCOPEX North and South), Howell Swell, Jeffreys Ledge, Jordan Basin, Lindenkohl Basin, and Stellwagen Bank.

The Canadian Whale Institute conducts and supports activities to better understand and protect marine mammals and promote responsibility for their habitats. They collaborate with marine industries to develop solutions, conduct scientific research, provide educational programmes, and rescue marine mammals entangled in gear.

The Channel Islands Cetacean Research Unit (CICRU) contributes daily to cetacean research and understanding the health of the oceans. CICRU is a bio-surveillance research group analysing the health of the ocean through the health of cetaceans. They believe in ‘One Ocean, One Health.’

Tidal Energy is teaming up with scientists to better understand the potential impact of tidal turbine power generators on local marine life, including whales and other marine mammals. The group is utilising the Whale Alert platform to survey and track the movements of marine mammals in the proposed areas of development and will be using the platform to monitor the environment on an ongoing basis.

A partnership between NPS Glacier Bay, Whale Alert, NOAA, and the state of Alaska provides in-season daily updates of whale presence to reduce vessel strikes in the waters of Southeast Alaska. Vetted industry members, including cruise ship operators and pilots for the Alaska Marine Highway System, use Whale Alert to keep informed of recent sightings.

The Marine Mammal Center advances ocean health through research, education, and response. In Northern California, our cetacean research and conservation staff and volunteers use the Whale Alert app to record whale sightings from the San Francisco Bay to the open ocean. These observations help monitor whale populations and reduce the risk of human impacts such as vessel strikes and entanglement.

Orca Network's Whale Sighting and Education Project encourages observation to increase awareness and knowledge about the Southern Resident Community of orcas (J, K and L pods), Bigg’s Transient orcas and other cetaceans, and foster a stewardship ethic to motivate a diverse audience to take action to protect and restore their critical habitat.

Beam Reach catalyzes marine conservation wherever endangered salmon-eating orcas roam — from northern California to southeast Alaska. We are bioacoustic experts who create innovative technological solutions with our non-profit, government, and industry partners to help save the whales — especially the Southern Resident Killer Whales (SRKWs).

The Ocean Wise Whales Initiative uses cutting-edge technology, citizen science, and non-invasive collection methods to monitor the health of whales and reduce threats through evidence-based solutions.

The Marine Mammal Advisory Group is a cohort of independent stakeholders established to collaborate on the protection of biodiversity, and to explore solutions to strikes and collisions for the sailing & boating sector.

The Ørsted vision is a world that runs entirely on green energy. Ørsted is the global leader in offshore wind, responsible for more than a quarter of the world’s installed offshore wind capacity. Since 2006, they have increased the share of green energy in our heat and power generation from 13 to 64%. Now, they have set a new target of more than 95% green energy by 2023.​ Ørsted is a financial backer of Whale Alert and a key representative of a network of energy partners.

ProtectedSeas publishes the most comprehensive Marine Managed Area map online and is an active developer of ocean conservation technology. ProtectedSeas provides critical technical resources and ongoing support for the ever-expanding set of Whale Alert projects.

WhaleAlert was first launched in April 2012 as a free app for iPads and iPhones to display speed zone regulations and whale management areas on the US Atlantic Coast. The target audience was the shipping industry, and the app focused on easing compliance with existing regulations by displaying these measures on easy-to-read nautical charts with pop-up alerts to serve as reminders when vessels enter regulated areas. The mix of real-time (or near real-time) data projected over the internet to smartphones and tablets made compliance measures much easier to understand and act upon.

The ability to submit sightings allowed users to participate in the conservation of these species by reporting sightings of live, dead, and distressed animals.

In addition to protecting right whales, Whale Alert 2.0 incorporated a longer list of threatened and endangered species, including the blue whale, and expanded to cover Canadian and US Pacific waters. Combined with the addition of the app to the Android platform, this update made this tool national and international in scope and impact. 

While Whale Alert 2.0 provided users a way to submit sightings, the third Whale Alert update was all about letting users explore the sightings submitted.

Whale Alert now includes sightings from acoustic buoys and gliders, trusted human observers in the protected species observer and whale tour industries, and the general public.

Initially launched in North America, Whale Alert is now available in European waters with version 4.0. The new version includes Europe-specific features: 

• Incorporating European marine protected areas
• Updating marine mammal species
• Adding European maritime charts and navigation regulations
• Integrating indicator estimates the risk of collision during navigation, based on the size, speed, and location of the vessel 

European users also have the opportunity to obtain a ‘trusted observer’ status if they make several relevant observations and agree to undergo the certification process.