A conservation group has filed suit over a U.S. agency’s planned timeframe for dredging a Georgia coast shipping channel, arguing that using powerful pumps to suck up harbor sediments in summertime would endanger rare sea turtles.
For two years, environmentalists have battled an effort by the Army Corps of Engineers to end a policy that for three decades limited to winter months the dredging of accumulated sand and mud from harbors in Georgia and the Carolinas.
The seasonal limits have been in place since 1991. They are intended to protect sea turtles from being killed and maimed by the vacuum-like suction pumps of hopper dredges during the warmer months when female turtles lay their eggs on Southern beaches. Conservationists credit that policy with helping threatened and endangered turtle species begin a fragile rebound.
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