Simon Fraser University researchers have received nearly $1 million in special funding from the Digital Research Alliance of Canada to develop an artificial intelligence–powered system that forecasts whale movements in busy shipping corridors. The Humans and Algorithms Listening for Orcas (HALLO) project aims to help the Port of Vancouver and vessel pilots make more informed decisions about when and where to slow down for the Salish Sea’s endangered Southern Resident killer whales.
The system integrates real-time acoustic and visual data, vessel tracking, and citizen-scientist whale spotting reports to track not only where the Southern Resident J, K, and L pods currently are, but forecast where they’ll be over the next few hours.
“We’re using AI to support faster detection, more reliable classification of Southern Resident killer whales in and adjacent to shipping lanes,” says Ruth Joy, principal investigator on the HALLO team.
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