Beautiful footage captured underwater off the coast of California shows a Sunfish with a large chunk of its body missing, possibly because it was hit by a boat.

The video, filmed in September near Catalina Island, shows the injured animal swimming gracefully close to the surface, after surviving what looks like a serious injury.

The filmer later wrote online: "Upon closer inspection, we noticed a large chunk was taken out of him.

"This was most likely caused by a boat strike with the prop taking a large chunk out."

According to the filmer, the large Sunfish also had no fear of humans and hung around with them for some time.

Spotted this Ocean Sunfish (also known as mola mola) beneath a kelp patty near Catalina Island, California. These guys are very strange looking and this one was extra strange. Upon closer inspection we noticed a very large chunk was taken out of him. This was most likely caused by a boat strike with the prop taking a large chunk out. It's amazing he survived. It appears it happened some time ago. This sunfish had no fear of humans and hung out with us for some time.