A new whale detection network launches in San Francisco Bay, alerting ships in real time

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (AP) — Ferries, cargo ships and tankers cut through choppy waters in the San Francisco Bay Tuesday as a whale surfaced nearby, its spout barely visible against the white caps. Until now, whales could easily go unnoticed by mariners, but an AI-powered detection network launched this week is designed to track them day and night.

The system, called WhaleSpotter, scans the bay around the clock for whale blows and heat signatures up to 2 nautical miles away, alerting mariners to slow down or reroute when whales are nearby.

“They'll be able to make adjustments way before they get anywhere close,” said Thomas Hall, director of operations for San Francisco Bay Ferry. “It will also allow us to track data over time and see where the whales are camping out so we can adjust our routes during whale season to avoid those areas completely.”

The effort comes amid an alarming rise in gray whale deaths in the bay. Last year, 21 dead gray whales were found in the wider Bay Area — the highest number in 25 years, according to The Marine Mammal Center — with at least 40% killed by ship strikes. At least 10 more have died in the Bay Area so far this year.

Scientists say those figures likely underestimate the true toll as many whale carcasses sink or are swept back out to sea before they are ever found or reported.

Gray whales have long migrated along the California coast on their roughly 12,000-mile (19,300-kilometer) journey between breeding lagoons in Mexico and feeding grounds in the Arctic.

But instead of simply passing offshore, increasing numbers are now diverting into San Francisco Bay and lingering for days or even weeks inside the crowded estuary — a shift scientists increasingly link to climate change. Warming temperatures and shifts in sea ice in the Arctic are disrupting the food web gray whales rely on during summer feeding months, according to a 2023 study in Science, leaving many malnourished during migration.

Many whales now concentrate in a high traffic corridor between Angel Island, Alcatraz and Treasure Island, directly overlapping with ferry routes and shipping lanes.

“It’s the worst place possible in terms of all the ship traffic,” said Rachel Rhodes, a project scientist at the Benioff Ocean Science Laboratory who led the initiative. There have been so many collisions that “the teams responding to strandings said they ran out of places to even land dead whales.”

The eastern North Pacific gray whale population was once hailed as a conservation success story after rebounding from commercial whaling and being removed from the Endangered Species Act in 1994. But numbers have since plummeted, decreasing by half over the last 10 years, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Just 13,000 remain.

“They may not be getting the quality or quantity of food they’re used to in the Arctic,” Rhodes said. “That means they’re starting this incredibly long migration at a disadvantage.”

Artificial intelligence automatically flags potential whale sightings, which are then verified by trained marine mammal observers before alerts are sent via radio to ferry operators, vessel traffic controllers and posted publicly on the Whale Safe website.

WhaleSpotter systems are already used on vessels and fixed installations such as lighthouses and coastal towers in the United States, Canada and Australia. But researchers say the San Francisco Bay network is the first to directly integrate land-based and vessel-mounted detections with official mariner alerts, allowing whale sightings to be relayed in near-real time to ships navigating the bay.

The first hours of testing produced an immediate flood of detections.

“Suddenly to have a full sense of how much whale activity is in this space honestly put me a little bit on edge," said Douglas McCauley, director of the Benioff lab. "But we're going to use that data and we're going to be smart about how we use that space and share it with the whales.”

Researchers say the system’s biggest advantage is constant monitoring. Unlike human observers, thermal cameras can operate through the night and in many foggy conditions common in the bay.

One camera was installed on Angel Island and a second will soon be fixed aboard a ferry traveling between downtown San Francisco and Vallejo to create what Rhodes described as a “moving data collection platform.” Scientists hope additional cameras on the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz could eventually expand coverage across the bay.

A severe marine heat wave lingering off the California coast is shrinking the band of cold, nutrient-rich water where krill, anchovies and sardines thrive. As offshore waters warm, humpback whales are increasingly following that prey closer to shore, where California’s Dungeness crab fishery operates.

The fishery uses tens of thousands of vertical lines that connect traps on the seafloor to surface buoys, creating entanglement hazards for whales migrating and feeding along the coast.

This spring, regulators again closed parts of the fishery off central California to conventional gear, a measure that has become increasingly common in recent years as warming waters increase whale overlap with crab fishing seasons.

While grey whales are also at risk, humpbacks are most vulnerable.

“Humpbacks are curious and they’ll scratch their backs on the gear,” said Kathi George, director of cetacean conservation biology at The Marine Mammal Center. “If they get a line caught on their body, they’ll breach and they’ll roll and end up entangling themselves.”

Whales can drag heavy gear for months, unable to dive or feed properly, leading to starvation, infection and drowning.

Thirty-six whales were confirmed entangled off the West Coast in 2024 — the highest number since 2018, according to NOAA – though scientists caution most cases go undocumented.

California approved commercial use of ropeless pop-up crab fishing gear for the first time this spring, which will allow fishermen to continue harvesting through the end of the season.

Instead of floating surface buoys tethered to traps, the system stores ropes and buoys on the seafloor until fishermen return and trigger an acoustic release that brings the gear to the surface.

Supporters say the technology allows fishermen to continue harvesting crab while dramatically reducing the risk to whales.

As climate change reshapes ocean conditions and whale migration patterns, scientists expect the overlap between whales, ships and fishing gear to persist.

“We will have to continue to be adaptive and science driven in terms of our management to reduce wildlife risk and keep fishermen on the water,” said Caitlynn Birch, Oceana’s Pacific campaign manager and a marine scientist. “California has been a national leader in developing whale-safe fishing technologies and we hope that model can help guide other fisheries on the West Coast and nationally.”

Follow Annika Hammerschlag on Instagram: @ahammergram.

The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment

Passengers ride a San Francisco Bay ferry, Tuesday, May 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Annika Hammerschlag)

Tankers are visible throughout the San Francisco Bay, Tuesday, May 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Annika Hammerschlag)

FILE - Hunter Nguyen, right, and Jonathan Tin, load crab traps, pop-up gear aimed at preventing whale entanglements, onto the boat Pale Horse at Pier 45 in San Francisco, April 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Emily Steinberger, File)

FILE - Fresh Dungeness crabs fill a tank at the Alioto-Lazio Fish Company at Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco, Jan. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Eric Risberg, File)

Whale carcasses lie on a beach on Angel Island in San Francisco Bay, Tuesday, May 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Annika Hammerschlag)

A WhaleSpotter device that scans the bay around the clock for whale blows and heat signatures is mounted on a tower on Angel Island in San Francisco Bay, Tuesday, May 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Annika Hammerschlag)

A tanker and other vessels pass through the San Francisco Bay, Tuesday, May 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Annika Hammerschlag)

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia Republicans will keep duking it out among themselves as they head toward a runoff to pick their candidates for governor and U.S. Senate in the battleground state after Tuesday's primary failed to produce outright victors.

The Senate runoff will feature former college football coach Derek Dooley and Rep. Mike Collins, while Rep. Buddy Carter was knocked out of the race. The winner will go up against Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in one of the most closely watched campaigns in the November midterm elections.

Lt. Gov. Burt Jones and healthcare billionaire Rick Jackson advanced to the runoff in the Republican primary for governor, extending their bruising and expensive campaign battle. Former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms clinched the Democratic nomination on Tuesday.

With about a month to go until the June 16 runoff, Republicans will spend more time and money competing among themselves before they turn their attention to their Democratic opponents in key races.

Ossoff is the only Democratic senator in the country seeking reelection this year in a state that President Donald Trump won two years ago, making him a tempting target for Republicans as they defend their Senate majority.

Bottoms hopes to become the first Democrat to win a Georgia governor's race since 1998. She received a rare endorsement from former President Joe Biden after serving in his administration, and she said Tuesday night that she wanted to make sure “every Georgian has an opportunity to succeed."

“It means stopping Donald Trump every time his policies hurt Georgia, and also taking action here to make life better for people across the state,” she said.

Ossoff, 39, had no opposition in Tuesday's primary. This is his first reelection campaign. He has positioned himself as a critic of political corruption, targeting Trump and his sons for business dealings that have enriched the first family.

Meanwhile, the Republican primary has been a test of fealty to the president, who did not endorse a candidate. Collins, Dooley and Carter each said they would be the best person to advance Trump's agenda in Washington.

In addition, Collins faced attacks over a House ethics complaint accusing him of abusing taxpayer funds by paying the girlfriend of a top aide for work she allegedly didn't perform. The Office of Congressional Conduct, after an initial inquiry, has referred the matter to the House Ethics Committee.

“If taxpayers can’t trust you to properly steward their money, how can they trust you to be a U.S. senator?” Carter asked Collins in a primary debate.

“Buddy,” Collins shot back, “I can tell through your voice that you know how the polling is going out there.”

Collins sponsored the Laken Riley Act, a 2025 law that requires immigrants be detained when charged with certain crimes. Republicans believe the issue damages Ossoff because he initially voted against the measure before supporting it after Trump returned to the White House.

“You can replace a Democrat with an actual conservative,” Collins said Tuesday night.

More than $125 million has been spent on advertising in the Republican primary for governor, with more than $66 million of that spent by Jackson’s campaign, according to the latest figures from ad-tracking firm AdImpact. By contrast, Democrats running for governor have only spent about $4 million.

Jones argues that his conservative record as a state senator and lieutenant governor, combined with Trump's endorsement, should make him the clear choice for Republican voters.

“I think Georgia just spoke, y’all,” Jones said at his election night party. He added, “I could not leave this stage without thanking President Donald J. Trump."

A win from Jones would boost the president’s influence in Georgia after a string of setbacks. Trump failed to dislodge Gov. Brian Kemp and others in 2022, and he backed Herschel Walker’s losing campaign against Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock that year.

However, Jackson is betting that his outsider pitch will win over antiestablishment conservatives. On Tuesday night, he called Jones a political insider who is “working inside the system for his own benefit.”

“I cannot be bought, and I will not back down,” Jackson said.

Democrat Jasmine Clark won her party’s nomination on Tuesday to succeed Rep. David Scott for a two-year term representing Georgia’s 13th Congressional District after Scott died in April while seeking another term.

Clark is a state representative, microbiologist and a lecturer at Emory University who has promised to prioritize science in Congress. Her candidacy was boosted by more than $2 million in outside spending by cryptocurrency interests, but Clark said she did not court the support.

Clark will be the odds-on favorite to succeed Scott for a full term starting next January, with Jonathan Chavez unopposed to become the Republican nominee.

In the 11th District northwest of Atlanta, Loudermilk announced his retirement and endorsed staffer Rob Adkerson, who advanced to a runoff against neurologist John Cowan.

In the 10th District east of Atlanta, state Rep. Houston Gaines is the top Republican seeking to take the departing Collins' seat. Jim Kingston, the son of longtime U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston, is the top Republican to take Carter's seat in coastal Georgia's 1st District.

In northeast Georgia's 9th District, three-term Republican incumbent Andrew Clyde fended off primary challenges from former Gainesville Mayor Sam Couvillon and Hall County Commissioner Gregg Poole.

Tuesday is the general election for Georgia's judgeships. The posts are technically nonpartisan, but eight of the nine justices on the state Supreme Court were appointed by Republicans governors. Democrats are supporting Miracle Rankin in her challenge to Justice Charlie Bethel. They hope a strong Democratic turnout could produce the first defeat of an incumbent justice since 1922.

Justice Sarah Hawkins Warren won over Democrat-supported former state Sen. Jen Jordan on Tuesday. A third justice, Ben Land, is unopposed for a six-year term.

The state Judicial Qualifications Commission, which investigates allegations of wrongdoing by judges, said in statements dated Sunday that Jordan and Rankin violated rules of judicial conduct by publicly endorsing each other and making statements supporting the restoration of abortion rights.

The commission said it reached its conclusions, which are not a final determination, after receiving and reviewing a complaint about each candidate.

State Democratic Party Chair Charlie Bailey called the commission's statements “a cynical attempt by a mere bureaucratic arm of the Georgia Republican establishment to hide the truth about this race from Georgia voters.”

——

This article has been corrected to show it's the Laken Riley Act, not the Lake Riley Act.

Amy is a former Associated Press reporter. Associated Press reporter Mike Catalini in Morrisville, Pennsylvania, contributed.

Georgia gubernatorial candidate Rick Jackson talks to a supporter after speaking during a primary election night party on Tuesday, May 19, 2026, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

Georgia gubernatorial candidate Burt Jones speaks during a primary election night watch party, Tuesday, May 19, 2026, in Jackson, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)

Gubernatorial candidate Keisha Lance Bottoms waves to supporters after winning the democratic nomination during her election night watch party Tuesday, May 19, 2026, in Atlanta. (Natrice Miller/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP)

Republican gubernatorial candidate Derek Dooley speaks to supporters at his election night party Tuesday, May 19, 2026, in Atlanta. (Daniel Varnado/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP)

U.S. Rep. Mike Collins, R-Ga., speaks at his primary election watch party in Jackson, Ga. on Tuesday, May 19, 2026. (Arvin Temkar/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP)

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Derek Dooley speaks at a campaign stop at Farmview Market in Madison, Ga., on May 8, 2026. (Arvin Temkar/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP)

Georgia gubernatorial candidate Burt Jones meets with supporters during a primary election night watch party, Tuesday, May 19, 2026, in Jackson, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)

U.S. Rep. Mike Collins, R-Ga., speaks to supporters in Acworth, Ga., on Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Jeff Amy)

Georgia Republican candidate for governor Burt Jones speaks to supporters Tuesday, May 12, 2026, in Smyrna, Ga. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Jackson speaks to voters during a campaign stop, Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Hiram, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Keisha Lance Bottoms, arrives to vote early in the Georgia Primary Election, Thursday, May 7, 2026, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)