Orcas have been documented ramming giant sunfish with such force that the prey shreds into small pieces, in rare footage revealing the predatory power of the marine mammals.
Marine biologist Kathryn Ayres recorded the first incident on a GoPro camera in July 2024, capturing a female orca holding a sharptail mola while a male rammed it repeatedly off the coast of Baja California Sur, Mexico. A juvenile from the group was later seen feeding on fragments of the fish, which can grow over three metres long and weigh up to two tonnes. A second instance was recorded by a tourism operator near Isla Cerralvo in September 2025.
The independently captured incidents were analysed in a study published in the journal Frontiers in Ethology, offering new insight into how killer whales hunt large, slow-moving prey in the Gulf of California.