Orca Attack Results in Beached Great White Shark Carcass with Liver Ripped Out

A great white shark carcass was beached after being attacked by an orca, and it is believed that its predators tore out its liver.

A shark biologist named Alison Towner posted images of the dead shark on Facebook on August 21. Images reveal a clear hole on its underside.

Off the coast of South Africa, numerous other great white shark deaths are thought to have been caused by a single killer whale pair since 2017. Their fatty internal organs, including their hearts as well as livers, are believed to be removed and eaten.

Orcas appear to actively seek out foods with high levels of lipids, and it appears that they enjoy eating these big, fatty organs.

Increasing Numbers of Beached Shark Carcasses

Since the first carcasses began to wash ashore, Towner has been conducting research into the killing of great white sharks by orcas off of the coast of South Africa. She claimed in a Facebook post that this was the first time an orca-killed great white shark had washed up in Hartenbos, Mossel Bay.

She stated in a Facebook post that it never gets any easier to see the beached body. The dead shark is a subadult female shark that was extremely fresh.

Towner contributed to a study that examined great white shark fatalities and was published in the African Journal of Marine Science. Four of the five white sharks that were beached in Gansbaai, South Africa, between February and June of 2017 had their livers completely removed.

Towner said that The sharks' pectoral fins bore the impressions of killer whale teeth, and their livers had been neatly removed; to tear a great white shark open and accomplish this would require the cooperation of powerful animals.

All the indications point to killer whale predation, which was also confirmed by killer whale biologists, and it was also supported by the fact that each time a dead shark washed up, killer whales had been spotted nearby.

This recently deceased shark displayed elements of this signature neat approach as well.

It's a remarkably clean tear that varies in size but typically measures about the width of the space between the pec fins, Towner continued. Since it is attached to the liver so closely, the heart is frequently absent as well. Her team discovered a fresh seal in the stomach of the last white shark they necropsied after it was killed by orcas.

In conjunction with Shark Week on Discovery Channel, the first video of orcas attacking and killing a great white shark was recently made public. It shows an orca biting a dead shark near the location of its liver.

As a species listed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List and already under pressure from bycatch and direct fishing, the local increase in orcas preying on great whites is alarming.

The great white sharks in the area in which the orca attacks have occurred, according to the African Journal of Marine Science paper, are migrating away from the area, possibly to avoid predators.

Ecosystem Balance

Towner went on to say that what they appear to be seeing is an avoidance strategy at a large-scale, as opposed to a fine-scale one, similar to what wild dogs in Serengeti use in response to the increasing lion activity. The longer the sharks stay away, the more frequently the orcas visit these areas.

The local marine life may be impacted as a result of the decline in great white shark populations off the coast of Cape Town.

According to Towner, balance is essential for marine ecosystems. For instance, without great white sharks to control their behavior, cape fur seals may hunt critically endangered African penguins or compete with one another for the small pelagic fish those penguins eat, Newsweek reports.