Follow a right-whale rule through its documents

Which agency and docket hold the right whale speed rule?

The most recent completed right whale vessel speed rule is still the 2008 final rule (73 FR 60173), amended in 2013 and 2014; the March 4, 2026 document is an advance notice, not a new rule. NOAA Fisheries, through its Office of Protected Resources, holds authority over the North Atlantic Right Whale Vessel Strike Reduction Rule under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The agency’s action page lists the rule’s current status as Notice.

The agency’s tracking page for the vessel strike reduction rule lists the current phase as an advance notice of proposed rulemaking, published March 4, 2026. That notice is soliciting information on replacing seasonal speed restrictions with alternative management areas and technology-based strike-avoidance measures.

The notice falls short of a final action, and the page does not claim operational effect for any vessel voyage. Before pulling a comment, a permit condition, or a compliance date from this docket, confirm which document status applies.

The agency’s page separates “Notice” from proposed rule and final rule stages, and it credits the Office of Protected Resources with the March 3, 2026 update. That attribution matters for anyone citing the record, since it identifies who currently owns the docket’s content and timeline.

Anyone tracing the rule’s paper trail should start at that single agency page before branching into the Federal Register history it links, since the page functions as the index for every document that follows.

Put notices and comments in document order

Reading the docket in chronological order prevents mixing an old proposal with the current notice. The agency’s action page lists the history in reverse order, but reconstructing forward gives a clearer sense of how the rule has moved.

The published sequence, oldest to newest, runs:

• 2004 Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (69 FR 30857, September 13, 2004)
• 2006 Proposed Rule to Implement Speed Restrictions (71 FR 36299, June 26, 2006)
• 2008 Final Speed Rule (73 FR 60173, October 10, 2008)
• 2013 Removal of “Sunset” Provision from the Speed Rule (78 FR 73726, December 9, 2013)
• 2014 Correction to the Removal of the “Sunset” Provision (79 FR 34245, June 16, 2014)
• 2022 Proposed Rule (87 FR 46921, August 1, 2022)
• 2022 Proposed Rule Comment Period Extension (87 FR 56925, September 16, 2022)
• 2025 Proposed Rule Withdrawal (90 FR 4711, January 16, 2025)
• 2026 Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (March 4, 2026)

Each entry corresponds to a distinct Federal Register citation, and the agency page links each one individually. Reading these entries as a single continuous timeline shows where a proposal was later withdrawn and where a new notice reopened the subject, a pattern that stays hidden when each document is read on its own.

Supporting materials sit alongside this sequence in a separate list on the page, among them a 2020 speed rule assessment, a 2024 technology workshop, and the 2008 Final Environmental Impact Statement. These sit outside the Federal Register history, and none of them carries a Federal Register citation on this page. What role each one plays in the rulemaking is a question for the documents themselves; the index only points to where they sit.

Separate a proposal from an effective requirement

A proposed rule and an effective requirement are two different kinds of document, and the docket’s own labels make that distinction explicit. The 2022 entry is marked “Proposed Rule,” while the 2008 entry is marked “Final Speed Rule.”

Only the latter category historically created binding obligations once it took effect. The 2022 proposal (87 FR 46921) was never finalized as posted.

Its comment period was extended later that year (87 FR 56925), and the proposal itself was withdrawn in January 2025 (90 FR 4711). What the page shows after that withdrawal is one more document, the 2026 advance notice. It lists no final rule issued at any point after 2008, and no entry that changes the 2008 rule other than the 2013 removal and the 2014 correction.

The March 2026 document sits earlier in the process than either a proposed rule or a final rule. It is an advance notice of proposed rulemaking, a stage the agency’s page describes as gathering information on possible deregulatory changes to the existing speed rule framework.

Advance notices ask questions and collect input; they do not impose or repeal a requirement. Anyone checking whether a specific speed restriction currently applies needs the document’s status label first, with the subject line serving only as a pointer to it.

One more layer sits under all of this. The Federal Register’s own legal status notice says FederalRegister.gov is not an official legal edition and does not replace the official print version or the official electronic version on GPO’s govinfo.gov, and that until the Administrative Committee of the Federal Register grants it official status, its XML rendition does not provide legal notice to the public or judicial notice to the courts. Each posted document links to its official PDF. Chase a citation far enough and that PDF is where it ends.

Track the final action and any later changes

The 2008 Final Speed Rule remains the most recent completed rulemaking in this docket’s published history. Two later Federal Register entries adjusted it directly: a 2013 removal of the rule’s “sunset” provision (78 FR 73726) and a 2014 correction to that removal (79 FR 34245).

The docket files both as amendments to the existing final rule. Since 2014, its only recorded activity is proposals, and no second final rule appears in that span.

The 2022 proposal was withdrawn in 2025, and the March 2026 posting is an advance notice, a stage that comes before any proposed rule text. The published history includes no final rule that supersedes the 2008 speed rule and its 2013 and 2014 amendments.

Tracing “the final action” for this rule means citing the 2008 rule together with its two amendment notices, since later Federal Register entries change that combination without replacing it outright. A 2026 advance notice signals that the agency is considering changes, but signaling and enacting are different documents with different legal weight.

Anyone relying on this record for a compliance decision should note which citation is the base final rule, which are amendments to it, and which are still-open proposals with no binding text yet. Conflating those categories misstates what is currently required.

Keep applicability tied to the exact record

Applicability tracks the specific document cited. The docket includes a final rule, amendments to that rule, a withdrawn proposal, and an open advance notice, and each one carries different legal weight for a given date and vessel situation. The general label “the right whale rule” only points toward this docket; the specific document decides what actually applies.

Before treating any provision as binding, match it to a document status: final, amended, withdrawn, or notice-stage. The agency’s own tracking page keeps these categories in separate entries instead of a single unified text, and the underlying Federal Register citations carry the enforceable language, when any exists, for a given period.

A practical approach is to note the citation number alongside its status label whenever referencing a requirement from this docket, since citation numbers change across the 2004 through 2026 timeline while the subject stays the same. That habit is an organizational suggestion for tracing the record, not a claim about what any reader’s vessel operation must do.

Confirming what applies to a specific voyage or date means checking the applicable Federal Register citation directly; the agency’s summary page functions as an index, and the citation itself carries the legal text.

Was the 2022 proposed rule adopted? No. It was withdrawn in January 2025 (90 FR 4711). What is the latest completed rulemaking? The 2008 final speed rule (73 FR 60173), with its 2013 and 2014 amendments.