--- title: Man Face Got in the Middle of a Seal Octopus Fight description: A kayaker off the coast of New Zealand got his face slapped by an octopus during an oceanic seal-octopus fight. canonical: https://time.com/5406992/seal-octopus-slap/ author: Raisa Bruner article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-09-26T17:01:50.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:55:06.774Z og:title: Man's Face Got in the Middle of a Seal-Octopus Fight og:description: The kayaker got slapped in the face by an octopus wielded by a seal og:url: https://time.com/5406992/seal-octopus-slap/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltedd7b4d7ace66552/69893b2bab6d7725006b3c5c/octopus-under-water.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4731 og:image:height: 2661 og:image:alt: Octopus Cave theme park og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Man's Face Got in the Middle of a Seal-Octopus Fight twitter:description: The kayaker got slapped in the face by an octopus wielded by a seal twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltedd7b4d7ace66552/69893b2bab6d7725006b3c5c/octopus-under-water.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # A Seal Slapped a Man in the Face With an Octopus Because Nature Never Stops Surprising > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement.  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Sep 26, 2018 5:01 PM UTC  An octopus in the Octopus Cave in Timmendorfer Strand, Germany, 01 March 2017\. Photo: Markus Scholz/dpa | usage worldwide (Photo by Markus Scholz/picture alliance via Getty Images) An octopus in the Octopus Cave in Timmendorfer Strand, Germany, 01 March 2017\. Photo: Markus Scholz/dpa | usage worldwide (Photo by Markus Scholz/picture alliance via Getty Images)picture alliance—picture alliance via Getty Image  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Sep 26, 2018 5:01 PM UTC [New Zealand](http://time.com/5405405/new-zealand-jacinda-ardern-baby-u-n/) is wild. Just ask this Kiwi kayaker, [Kyle Mulinder](https://www.instagram.com/barekiwi/?hl=en), who happened to be in “the wrong place at the wrong time” to get slapped directly in the face by an [octopus](http://time.com/5403031/octopuses-mdma-study/) wielded by a seal. Yes, you read that right: a seal had an octopus in its mouth in the midst of a battle royale of marine creatures. The seal emerged from the water flailing around with the octopus, which ended up hitting the unsuspecting kayaker in the face while he was out enjoying the great outdoors. “We were just sitting out in the middle of the ocean and then this huge male seal appeared with an octopus and he was thrashing him about for ages,” Mulinder [told Yahoo News](https://au.news.yahoo.com/extraordinary-moment-seal-throws-live-octopus-kayaker-031541803.html) about the freak encounter with nature. Then came the big moment. “I was like ‘mate, what just happened?’” As it turns out, Mulinder was out kayaking with a team of content creators for GoPro testing camera equipment — so they were able to capture all the footage of the incident on video. Mulinder appears to be fine now, and so is the octopus, which apparently stayed stuck to his kayak and out of the grasp of the seal following the fight. The attack happened near Kaikoura, which is a town on the South Island of New Zealand, and just adds to the mystique of the island nation as a truly unique place. And now we also know that seals and octopuses don’t get along. > [](https://twitter.com/AddBrocke/status/1044983115905667072) Here is a [GIF](https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/9j317u/seal%5Fslaps%5Fa%5Fkayaker%5Fin%5Fthe%5Fface%5Fwith%5Fan%5Foctopus/) of the slap moment. > [](https://twitter.com/DerangedRadio/status/1044879526386380801) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5406992/seal-octopus-slap/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5406992/seal-octopus-slap/"},"headline":"A Seal Slapped a Man in the Face With an Octopus Because Nature Never Stops Surprising","datePublished":"2018-09-26T17:01:50.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:55:06.774Z","description":"It was seal vs. octopus, and this man was in the middle","url":"https://time.com/5406992/seal-octopus-slap/","keywords":["Newsfeed","animals","Bizarre"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltedd7b4d7ace66552/69893b2bab6d7725006b3c5c/octopus-under-water.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Raisa Bruner","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltedd7b4d7ace66552/69893b2bab6d7725006b3c5c/octopus-under-water.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Octopus Cave theme park","caption":"Octopus Cave theme park","creditText":"picture alliance—picture alliance via Getty Image","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5406992/seal-octopus-slap/","name":"A Seal Slapped a Man in the Face With an Octopus Because Nature Never Stops Surprising"}}]}] ```