After hundreds of dolphins washed up on Peru’s Pacific coast, and thousands of sea birds died in the same area, research has shown that the US Navy may hurt more dolphins and whales by using sonar and explosives.

The report, issued by the US Navy itself, comes clean and estimates that setting off explosives and using sonar may unintentionally cause more than 1,600 instances of hearing loss or other injury to marine mammals each year. The Navy also calculates the explosives could potentially kill more than 200 marine mammals a year.

While the findings are disturbing, one must also give the US Navy credit for divulging the information. The Navy uses sonar to track enemy submarines, torpedoes, mines and other potential threats underwater. Scientists say the sound may disrupt marine animals’ feeding patterns and startle some species of whales, causing them to surface rapidly.

The Navy also expanded the scope of its study to include things like in-port sonar testing — something sailors have long done but wasn’t analyzed in the Navy’s last environmental impact statement. But the Navy is also trying. Zak Smith, staff attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said he’s encouraged the Navy reduced the threshold for the level of sonar it found to affect beaked whales — a species that appears to be particularly sensitive to the noise.

Of course, there are many other activities that cause harm to mammals and sea life – most notably bomb fishing. We have seen instances of this in Malta on occasion, and apart from being very dangerous, it causes untold harm to sea life and the sea bed.

We must learn to accept that there is a whole new world under the sea. It is only those who dive, recreationally or otherwise, who can see the damage that we cause.

It is not limited to bombs and sonar either, there are castaway fishing nets, lures, fishing tackle and line, and all manner of other discarded items that find their way onto reefs and into creatures’ stomachs.

In addition, our maritime activities also cause harm in terms of pollutants being dumped in the water – both intentionally, and unintentionally. The oceans and our seas are just as important as our forests, they sustain our planets. But if we keep on causing as much harm as we do, in upsetting the food chain, then we will be in for a nasty surprise. The world’s resources are running out and if we continue to treat the ocean and all its creatures with such contempt, then we are really headed for disaster.