The video of the incident was shared by New Zealand fisherman Tony Walker on Instagram on July 5.
According to Newsweek, Walker and his group encountered a mako shark over 2.4 meters long while they were fishing for swordfish in Australia’s Coral Sea.
“Aggressive mako!” shouted one of the fishermen as they saw the shark biting the tail of the swordfish while they attempted to pull it up.
“Let go of my fish! Give me back my fish! Give it back to me!” another crew member yelled as they continued to pull the swordfish away from the shark’s jaws.
The mako shark eventually swam away but quickly returned to the side of the boat.
“It’s back!” a fisherman shouted as the shark returned to bite the tail of the swordfish again.
According to the video footage, the fishermen tried to pull the line to bring the swordfish aboard as quickly as possible, but the shark managed to bite off a large section of its tail.
Their basic strategy is to bite the tail of the swordfish first to eat at their leisure.
Walker’s Instagram video quickly went viral, garnering over 21 million views. In an interview with Newsweek, he mentioned that this was not the first time he and his group had encountered mako sharks while fishing.
“Mako sharks are common in the area. Their basic strategy is to bite the tail of the swordfish first to eat at their leisure. This happens almost daily for us, and quite often, the sharks ‘camp’ under our boat,” Walker added.
There are two types of mako sharks: shortfin and longfin makos. They can grow up to 4 meters long and are listed as endangered in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.
