05-20-2008 Japan
A flying fish has been captured on film off the coast of Japan, in what may be the longest recorded flight of the species.

The footage was shot on a ferry off Yakushima Island.

The flying fish was seen flying in parallel with the boat, which was moving at about 30km per hour.

The fish was able to continue flying by occasionally beating the surface of the water with its tail fin when it began to lose altitude.

According to Junji Yonezawa at the Center for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries on Outlying Islands, the flight time of 45 seconds beats the previous record of 42 seconds reported by an American researcher in the 1920s.