---
kind: "section"
citation: "33 U.S.C. § 1473"
title: "33"
title_heading: "Navigation and Navigable Waters"
number: "1473"
heading: "Consultations and determinations respecting creation of hazards to human health, etc.; criteria for determinations respecting grave and imminent dangers of major harmful consequences to United States coastline or related interests"
release: "119-102"
date: "2026-07-12"
url: "https://uscodex.org/usc/33/1473"
units:
  - "Chapter 28 — Pollution Casualties on the High Seas: United States Intervention"
---

# §1473. Consultations and determinations respecting creation of hazards to human health, etc.; criteria for determinations respecting grave and imminent dangers of major harmful consequences to United States coastline or related interests

- (a) The [Secretary](/usc/33/1471.md?p=4), after consultation with the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency and the [Secretary](/usc/33/1471.md?p=4) of Commerce, shall determine when a substance other than those enumerated in the [protocol](/usc/33/1471.md?p=6) is liable to create a hazard to human health, to harm living resources, to damage amenities, or to interfere with other legitimate uses of the sea.
- (b) In determining whether there is grave and imminent danger of major harmful consequences to the coastline or related interests of the [United States](/usc/33/1471.md?p=7), the [Secretary](/usc/33/1471.md?p=4) shall consider the interests of the [United States](/usc/33/1471.md?p=7) directly threatened or affected including but not limited to, human health, fish, shellfish, and other living marine resources, wildlife, coastal zone and estuarine activities, and public and private shorelines and beaches.

## Source credit

(Pub. L. 93–248, § 4, Feb. 5, 1974, 88 Stat. 9; Pub. L. 95–302, § 1(3), June 26, 1978, 92 Stat. 344.)

## Notes

### Editorial Notes

### Amendments

1978—Pub. L. 95–302 added subsec. (a), designated existing provisions as subsec. (b), and inserted “human health,” before “fish”.

### Statutory Notes and Related Subsidiaries

### Effective Date of 1978 Amendment

For effective date of amendment by Pub. L. 95–302, see section 2 of Pub. L. 95–302, set out as a note under section 1487 of this title.