Curious shark checks out foot of angler with legs dangling off boat, Hawaii video shows

A fisherman who was obliviously dangling his feet off a kayak in the Pacific is counting his toes — after a near-miss involving a very large tiger shark.

The incident, which was caught in video, happened July 4 as Devin Kanda was fishing off Diamond Head on the Hawaiian island of Oahu.

Kanda is seen in the 27-second video with his legs shin-deep in the ocean, unaware of a fast moving dorsal fin until the shark was nearly upon him. He jerks his feet into the boat just in time, with the shark inches away.

The predator is last seen swimming under the kayak, as Kanda braces with both hands for a possible impact.

“A tiger shark came in looking for a bite while I was securing a fish in my fish bag,” he posted on YouTube. “Luckily, I saw it in time to pull my feet out of the water before it had a chance to bite my foot off.”

Kanda told Hawaii News Now he was storing a fish he’d just caught when he glimpsed something out of the corner of his eye and was in “awe” when he realized it was a shark.

“I just saw this mass coming toward me. I thought it was another kayak,” he told the station. “This thing is so massive... You can see the camera, it shakes a little because its head was right under the kayak rubbing against it.”

Kanda says he recorded the moment with a GoPro mounted to the kayak. The video has been viewed more than 10,000 times on YouTube, with commenters noting it was a very close call.

“Too dangerous. Had that tiger shark flipped that kayak, he would have be been lunch. Tiger sharks are one of the man eating sharks out there,” Jorge Rodi posted.