The sea lions briefly "got deathly silent" when the orca sailed into view....

...that was just before it tipped over.

The small fishing village of Astoria, Oregon, tried to scare off a pesky sea lion colony with a large fake mechanical orca. It was a cunning scheme, one that pitted the sly artifice of man against whatever it is sea lions have. But alas—nature won.

The plan to unleash the fiberglass orca—which is actually a licensed boat—was concocted to spook the sea lions using recorded whale noises and the visual threat of imminent death by top ocean-dwelling predator.

But the 32-foot-long fake whale’s maiden voyage didn’t exactly go... swimmingly.

LINK (via: Gizmodo)