To mitigate these environmental shifts, Steiner emphasized the need for regulatory intervention.
"The way to do that is to relist them on the Endangered Species Act, provide the management tools that NOAA needs in order to give these guys the best chance of making it through this climate bottleneck," he said.
NOAA Fisheries spokesperson Michael Milstein stated via email that the agency is reviewing the petition but has not set a specific timeline for a decision.
Milstein noted that the agency would require evidence of novel mortality factors before declaring another official "unusual mortality event," similar to the period between 2019 and 2023 when starvation and vessel strikes caused 690 strandings.
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"At this point, elevated strandings have continued, but all indications are that the causes remain the same," Milstein said.
