Fisherman Gets Fright Of His Life When Shark Bites His Kayak

A fisherman in Hawaii had a terrifying experience recently when a large tiger shark rammed and bit his kayak.

Scott Haraguchi was out fishing in shallow waters less than a mile off the coast of O’ahu, Hawaii when he had the scary encounter. He had just captured a big fish and, proud of his catch, he began to record it with his GoPro.

That’s when he heard a whooshing sound that he thought was a boat at first. Seconds later, the tiger shark emerged from the water and bit the side of his kayak.

“Whoa! A tiger shark rammed me,” Haraguchi can be heard shouting in the video. The experience was so terrifying he says if he hadn’t captured it on video people probably wouldn’t have believed him.

But it’s just lucky the shark didn’t grab his foot or tip over his kayak. Haraguchi says he spotted a wounded seal nearby and thinks it might have been a case of mistaken identify. He figures the tiger shark might have thought his kayak was the seal.

Here’s Haraguchi’s video:

He wrote on his YouTube channel, “Heard a ‘whooshing’ sound, looked up and saw a wide brown thing on the side of the kayak. Thought it was a turtle at first. Happened so fast.” He added that he hadn’t realized the shark had actually bitten his kayak not just rammed it until he got home and reviewed the video.

Several years ago another kayak fisherman, Mark McCracken, had a troublesome encounter with a hammerhead shark and had to keep it away from his boat with his paddle.

Haraguchi’s kayak experience is a far cry from Steve’s. The kayak fisherman had a completely different wild animal encounter. He rescued a raccoon from drowning off the Florida Keys.