TAMPA, Fla. — One of the world’s most endangered whales lost a layer of its protections last week after President Donald Trump’s administration rescinded guidance for oil and gas industry ships to slow down in their habitat to avoid hitting them.

The Rice’s whale, which lives in a sliver of the Gulf including off Tampa Bay, was already decimated by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, and scientists and environmentalists have called for urgent action to prevent their extinction. Previously thought to have been the same as Bryde’s whales, experts four years ago determined the Rice’s whale was a unique species. Estimates show there are fewer than 100 left.

The offshore oil and gas industry celebrated the rollback, saying it would save them billions. The move came as a result of an executive order from Trump, designed to strip away regulation to maximize domestic energy production.

But environmental advocates worry the move could be the start of a broader reversal: Federal ocean scientists have until May to develop an analysis on the rare species, and whale advocacy groups worry this rollback means fewer whale protections possibly coming.

The federal recommendations for vessel operators, introduced in August 2023, urged ships to slow down to roughly 11 mph as crews navigated through parts of the gulf where Rice’s whales are known to live, and to avoid traversing their habitat at night. To prevent fatal strikes, the guidance also suggested that ships used trained observers to spot whales and urged vessels to stay more than 1,500 feet away from them.

These were “common sense” recommendations to try and curb boat collisions, according to Michael Jasny, the director of marine mammal protection for the Natural Resources Defense Council. Jasny likened the guidance to laws requiring drivers to slow down in school zones.

“The consequences of fatal error are too dire to contemplate. And when you’re talking about one of the most endangered whales on the planet, it’s a reasonable thing to slow down in that school zone,” Jasny said in an interview.

The oil and gas industry praised the rollback.

“Existing data didn’t justify these recommended actions, which imposed significant burdens only on offshore oil and gas producers while failing to account for vessel traffic from other users operating in the region,” said Holly Hopkins, the vice president of upstream policy at the American Petroleum Institute, in a statement.

“We look forward to continuing to work with the Trump administration to safely and responsibly leverage our nation’s vast offshore oil and natural gas resources.”

The group commissioned a report to quantify how much the recommended slowdowns of ships would cost them. It concluded that the industry would contribute about $26 billion annually to the country’s GDP, compared to about $30 billion without slowing the ships. The analysis did not separate oil and gas companies’ profits from these broader figures.

It also warned of possible reductions of tens of thousands of jobs.

The whales, which grow to more than 40 feet, feed on tiny schooling fish during the day and rest near the ocean surface at night. That makes them especially susceptible to traversing ships that may not see the charcoal-gray giants at rest. The Tampa Bay region has an unfortunate history with the Rice’s whale: In 2009, a ship motored into the bay with a dead whale draped across its bow.

Scientists determined it was a female adult that was producing milk when she was struck and killed by the vessel. Federal ocean scientists assumed she was nursing a calf, which likely died after losing its mother. Photos from the event show a crowd of people surrounding the whales carcass slumped on the shore of Tampa Bay, the iconic Sunshine Skyway Bridge in the backdrop.

“We have determined this is a clear-cut case of a ship strike,” a whale stranding expert told the Tampa Bay Times at the time.

Rescinding protections for one of the world’s rarest whales to help the oil and gas industry represents the opposite approach to the one Florida Republicans took last year when they banned offshore wind turbines in waters near the state’s coastlines.

One reason proponents cited for the ban was concern for whales, saying the construction of the turbines disrupted their sonar. But scientists are skeptical offshore wind energy poses a major threat, especially compared to the dangers of ship collisions and climate change, as warming oceans threaten to make whales’ food less plentiful.

Steve Mashuda, the managing attorney for the oceans program at environmental law firm Earthjustice, said whether politicians bring up whales usually has more to do with what type of energy is being discussed.

“My refrain to a lot of the messaging, especially from the oil industry, being concerned about whales on the Atlantic coast because of wind energy has been, ‘If you’re concerned about whales being harmed by offshore energy, I’ve got a whale in the Gulf of Mexico I’d like you to meet,’” he said. “The Deepwater Horizon spill killed close to a quarter of the population alone.”

Those fighting for the Rice’s whales said that because these guidelines weren’t designed as a permanent solution, the effect of their rollback could be temporary.

As the result of a lawsuit, the federal government is working on more comprehensive restrictions on things like government permits to protect Rice’s whales, which are expected to be completed in May. In a statement, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said it was busy working on its analysis and submitted an update on that report earlier this month.

But this latest action has made Mashuda worried about what that broader order might look like.

“The Gulf doesn’t belong to the oil industry, the gulf belongs to all of us,” he said. “The oil industry is operating there in public waters, with public resources — and mitigating their activities to avoid causing extinction of a whale species is, in my mind, not a lot to ask.”

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