An artist's conception of the megalodon attacking a whale.
Scientists have found a fossil of a whale that was killed by a megalodon, the legendary shark that existed 20 to 3.6 million years ago. The fossil suggests that the whale was ambushed, bitten and thrashed by the bus-sized shark, Mashable said in a report. Last month, researchers in collaboration with the University of Zurich developed a 3D scan of the great shark, which revealed that it weighed more than 61 tonnes and had length of 16 metres. The scientists also said that the massive creature could swim through the seas at a speed of 1.4 metres per second.
The fossil was discovered by Mike Ellwood, who works for the Calvert Marine Museum in Maryland, in the United States. The 15-million-year-old fossil includes two whale vertebrae and a megalodon tooth, the Mashable report said.
The tooth had a chip, to show it was damaged, the outlet quoted Stephen Godfrey, the curator of paleontology at the museum, as saying.
"I see predation by megalodon as being violent and almost without parallel, although killer whales today probably come close. If you don't 'care' about breaking your teeth during an attack, you as a predator could be reckless, acting without restraint or caution," he further said.
The whale that was attacked by the megalodon survived for a couple of months. "The force of the megalodon's jaw was so strong that it broke the front end of the smashing vertebra. This would have been an excruciatingly painful injury for the whale," a press release about the research said.
Megalodon is considered to be the largest shark that ever existed, and one of the largest fish on record. According to IFL Science, its scientific name, Carcharocles megalodon, literally means "giant tooth" - and megalodon had massive teeth are almost three times larger than the teeth of a modern great white shark.