Court reinstates ban on lobster fishing near Maine to save whales – By Patrick Whittle (Associated Press) / Nov 17 2021
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — A U.S. appeals court has reinstated a ban on lobster harvesting in hundreds of miles of productive fishing waters off the Maine coast to try to protect rare whales.
The Maine Lobstering Union had won emergency relief to stop the closure of lobstering grounds, which federal regulators ruled was needed to help protect endangered North Atlantic right whales from extinction.
But the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday that the closure is back on. Removing the ban prevents the government from performing its task of protecting the whales from death by entanglement in gear, the court ruled.
The government’s role is “assuring the right whales are protected from a critical risk of death,” the court ruled.
