Visitors at the COEX Aquarium in South Korea's Gangnam District were in for a surprise when they visited the tourist spot on Jan. 29 because, not only did they realize one of the sharks was missing in the tank, they also found said missing shark in the mouth of one of its aquarium mates. The eight-year-old female sand tiger shark was seen swimming around for 21 hours as it slowly continued to ingest the five-year-old male bandit hound shark.
The attack most likely happened in the evening of Jan. 8 and aquarium officials could no longer do anything for the male shark since it was already being ingested by the time the incident was discovered. However they speculated that the attack was most likely the result of a turf war since sharks are highly territorial creatures.
The video shows half of the male shark's body inside the mouth of the female shark until only the tail can be seen. Watch the video of the female sand tiger shark swimming around with its victim below:
"I think the shark swallowed the whole body, because they usually eat it all when they bite the head part," Oh Tae-youp, COEX Aquarium's Press Relations Manager said.
The COEX Aquarium officials say that the other creatures sharing the aquarium - other species of sharks, stingrays and turtles- have been accounted for and are all unharmed, which backs up their speculation.
In an interview, one of the officials said that it is natural for a shark to bite when it is startled. Right now, COEX cannot do anything about the ingested bandit hound shark so they will just let the sand tiger shark keep it for a few days. They said the female will eventually regurgitate the 1.3 Meter long shark when it realizes that it cannot digest it so they will just have to keep their eyes open for when that time comes.
As for visitors of the aquarium, they get treated to "Survival of the fittest" in action.
