Chase Dekker was guiding a morning whale watch in Monterey Bay, California, on October 16 when he observed some playful behavior from a group of killer whales.

The whales, which he first observed feeding under water, were later seen “harassing” a seabird which Dekker identified on Facebook as a rhinoceros auklet. In aerial footage, the whales are seen treating the bird as a toy, acrobatically flipping it out of water with their tails.

While it’s safe to say the bird wasn’t having as much fun as the whales, Dekker wrote that, incredibly, it survived.

He said it was likely the whales were “teaching the younger whales in the pod how to hunt by using an easy target.” Credit: Chase Dekker via Storyful