Anthropogenic noise from shipping, seismic surveys, sonar, and construction is transforming ocean acoustic environments in ways that harm cetacean communication, navigation, behaviour, and in severe cases cause mass strandings.
Marine noise pollution causes cetacean welfare harm across a spectrum from acute acute injury in mass stranding events to chronic stress from communication disruption and sensory pollution. Beaked whale strandings linked to naval sonar represent the most dramatic welfare events — animals swimming to shore in apparent disorientation, suffering tissue damage from pressure injury, and dying on beaches. But the chronic effects of shipping noise on the daily welfare of millions of dolphins, whales, and porpoises may collectively represent greater total welfare harm: animals that cannot hear their pod members, cannot effectively use echolocation for prey finding, and cannot communicate reproductive status or distress. Regulatory frameworks for marine noise are developing slowly relative to the pace of the problem.