A 'super pod' comprising of hundreds of dolphins have been seen springing out of the water simultaneously more than a mile wide across the water in incredible new footage.
The “super pod”, comprising an estimated 500 dolphins, can be seen stretching off into the distance, leaping out of the water as they race a whale-watching boat.
The amazing scene was captured by the crew of the Catallac, the vessel travelling alongside the dolphins, while it toured the coast off Newport Beach, California, USA.
Super pods, which can number more than 1,000 dolphins, form where food is plentiful, but usually gather in deep water and are far rarer in shallower seas.
Jessica Roame, education manager at Newport Landing Whale Watching, which operates the Catallac, said the dolphins may also have been fleeing an unseen predator.
“Porpoising out of the water at a high rate of speed is the fastest mode of travel for dolphins because there is less resistance in the air than in water,” she said.
“That’s why these dolphins move in this way when they're in a hurry, and when hundreds of dolphins do this together, we call this a stampede.”
Jessica said it was not known exactly what causes dolphins to stampede, but it was thought they could have been evading a predator or catching up to a food source.
Jessica estimated that there were some 500 individual dolphins stampeding in the video.
A typical pod contains anything from two to 30.
“Every time you see a dolphin on the surface, there are normally three or four dolphins underneath the surface,” she said.
“They could be related family members in their pod, or multiple pods of common dolphins coming together, and likely this is because of food.”
Patrick Webster of Monterey Bay Aquarium, approximately 300 miles to the north, said a super pod sighting was one of the ocean’s “magical moments”.
“It is fairly rare to see them this close to shore and so readily observable by people,” he said, following a sighting in 2018.
"It's a very special sighting nearshore of one of the ocean's magical moments often hidden away from human observation.
“But to the dolphins, it was probably just another Monday.”
Newport Landing Whale Watching runs daily whale and wildlife watching tours of the Southern California coast all year round.
