The first legal challenge to the Navy is that the law prohibits making irreversible and irretrievable commitments of resources to a proposed action until the environmental impacts of that action are evaluated. (For a discussion of the applicable laws, see The Law.) In spite of that prohibition, the Navy expended more than $350 million to date and continues to make such irretrievable commitments.
The evidence that the Navy continues to make irreversible and irretrievable commitments of resources includes the fact that the Navy is building a ship (TAGOS-23) designed to carry the SURTASS LFA system (cost at least $60 million), constructing a second SURTASS LFA array, creating and installing software to operate the SURTASS LFA system, and otherwise making every necessary investment to have the SURTASS LFA prepared for deployment the moment the EIS is final or soon thereafter.
Under the law, most of those expenditures should not have been made until the EIS was complete. The level of expenditures to date is one factor calling into question the objectivity of the EIS being prepared.
The evidence that the environmental impact statement (EIS) process being conducted by the United States Navy is not an objective process can also be found in the draft EIS. The draft EIS ignores evidence of adverse effects found during the testing of SURTASS LFA and other LFAS systems, misrepresents the findings of the Navy's own research, and uses very limited and incomplete evidence to reach general conclusions regarding the potential impacts of deployment.
During March 1998 SURTASS LFA testing off Hawai`i , a swimmer in the water during a broadcast emerged with symptoms a doctor found to be similar to those of a trauma patient. The insonified swimmer continued to experience adverse physiological and psychological effects for months.
Plaintiffs in cases filed against the Navy in March 1998 filed statements documenting the exposure and the diagnosis.
The Navy admitted that the swimmer had been exposed to a broadcast.
At no time did the Navy ever attempt to examine the exposed swimmer or otherwise gather further information.
The final limit on broadcast exposure for divers found in the draft EIS is 100 times more intense (145 dB) than the broadcast causing the effects on the Hawaiian swimmer.
To review the declarations filed by the swimmer, the doctor, the boat captain recording the broadcast, and the scientist working for the Navy, click here.
Part of the evidence demonstrating the bias for deployment in the EIS process is found in the comments filed in response to the draft EIS.
The attorney for the Hawai`i County Green Party and for the plaintiffs in this case filed extensive comments on the deficiencies of the draft EIS prepared by the Navy.
Detailed comments on the deficiencies in the draft EIS.
Scientists, Federal agencies, and others filed comments detailing additional deficiencies in the draft EIS. The Stop LFAS Worldwide Network posted many of those comments at http://how.to/stoplfas
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