SAN DIEGO - Federal officials issued a permit Tuesday for the Navy to use sonar during a major exercise underway off Hawaii, sparking protest from environmentalists who say the sonar will harm whales.

Jim Lecky, director of the protected resources office at the National Marine Fisheries Service, said he was confident the Navy had implemented safeguards that would keep whales and other marine mammals from being harmed by the sonar.

The biennial Rim of the Pacific exercise, involving eight nations, 40 ships, six submarines and 19,000 military personnel, began Monday, but the exercises involving the use of sonar are not scheduled until next week.

Officials at the environmental action group Natural Resources Defense Council said they planned to file a lawsuit today in Los Angeles federal court to overturn the permit and block the Navy from its planned sonar tests during the exercise.

Joel Reynolds, senior attorney and director of the council's Marine Mammal Protection Project in Los Angeles, said it strikes them as absurd that the sonar tests would be allowed so soon after President Bush declared a 140,000-square-mile area near Hawaii to be a zone of protection for 7,000 species.

Calling it a unique ecosystem, Reynolds asked: "Why should the Navy be allowed to carry on a month of war games here?"

Two years ago, during a similar exercise, 150 melon-headed whales gathered in a shallow bay off Kauai, Hawaii. A federal study concluded that the sonar was the likely cause for the whales' unusual behavior.

The Navy and environmentalists have been at odds for several years over the experimental use of sonar. Several instances of whales beaching themselves have been attributed to sonar but the scientific evidence is a matter of dispute.

Lecky said he was satisfied that no whales would be hurt during this year's exercise because of the presence of spotters on ships and on planes who would warn the Navy to turn off the sonar if whales were seen. Also, "safety zones" have been established where the Navy cannot intrude.

The Navy says that the exercise is an invaluable way to train with allies, and that the sonar tests are particularly important.

The undersea geography in the Hawaiian Islands contains several channels of "choke points" similar to those of the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow opening in the Persian Gulf.

The sonar tests are used to see whether the Navy and other forces can detect stealthy diesel-powered submarines such as those being built or purchased by Iran, China and North Korea.

But officials at the Natural Resources Defense Council said the idea of military exercises in the region was inconsistent with Bush's desire to make the area a haven for wildlife of all kinds.

On June 15, the president created the marine protected zone.

Copyright 2006 Los Angeles Times

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