An enormous tiger shark attacked an angler fishing off the coast of Hawaii, taking out a chunk out of his kayak, with the scary incident caught on video.
Scott Haraguchi was fishing in his kayak on Friday afternoon near the coast of O’ahu when he heard a “whooshing sound” that he thought was a boat without a motor, the New York Post reported.
Seconds later, the fisherman’s GoPro camera filmed a massive tiger shark lunging at the kayak and taking a big bite.
The kayak was knocked sideways as Haraguchi screamed in panic, “A tighter shark rammed me! Holy [expletive]!”
He recalled that he was able to somehow shove the ferocious fish off his kayak with his foot and he went back to fishing, not thinking too much about the incident until later.
But upon viewing the video, he realized he had come close to being a snack for the hungry shark, and he noticed its tooth marks on his kayak.
In a separate YouTube video, Haraguchi explained that he at first thought the brown object approaching the side of his boat was a turtle.
The incident “happened so fast” that he didn’t realize what was going on.
“I took my left foot out of the water to brace myself from impact and actually pushed the shark’s head off with it,” he said. “If you asked me to do that again, even without the shark, I don’t think I’d have that flexibility.”
The angler is still uncertain why the shark attacked him, he told KITV4. But he wondered if the apex predator had mistaken his kayak for a seal that was swimming in the area.
“I’m thinking that the shark disabled and wounded the seal…and was waiting for it to die, came back and thought I was the seal, and attacked me instead,” he said.