About 50% of brass players in UK orchestras have permanent hearing damage and tinnitus.

But at least we can use our eyes instead of hearing - an option not available to many marine creatures for whom sound is matter of life and death.

And yet there are indications that humans have increased noise level in the seas by a factor of 10 in the last 30 years alone.

By far the greatest noise polluter of the seas is commercial shipping. Airguns prospecting for oil pound the ocean floor with blasts of extremely loud sound, while the latest type of anti-submarine sonar uses noise levels comparable to a military jet taking off.

Noisy Ape travels to a marine lab in Rhode Island, USA to investigate the effects of ocean noise and to find out whether noise pollution is driving whales to beach themselves.

A leading New York psychologist also tells us about her studies which prove that classrooms exposed to loud traffic noise can delay children's cognitive development by up to a year.

This has been known for nearly 30 years now - so why is nothing being done?

Listen again
	Noise is bad for you

External links
Discovery of Sound in the Sea
League for the Hard of Hearing
New York mayor in fight against noise pollution
The tinnitus and hyperacusis site
A Sound Ear: a 2002 seminar for music industry professionals tackling the issues of noise damage in orchestras

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