Andrea Humphreys is an experienced scuba diver and after 12 years of diving and 675 dives around the world she just had the “experience of a lifetime.” While diving in the waters near Campbell River, British Columbia she got hugged by a giant Pacific octopus and captured the incredible moment on video.
She was swimming with some other divers in search of an octopus when they spotted one out in the open floating among the kelp.
Andrea Humphreys
She and her fellow divers tried to give the octopus some space while they took photographs. But the octopus decided to get a closer look at Humphreys and soon got very “up close and personal.”
The octopus literally draped itself over her camera and embraced her.
“Its tentacles were reaching through the camera to feel my face and then at some point, it had crawled on my body, on my hips, and was giving me a hug,” she told CTV News.
“And it had tentacles up and around my mouth and it was sucking on my lip, which is the only exposed part of my body,” she added. The octopus spent about 40 minutes checking out Humphreys’ mask and camera.
She told the news station that the octopus’ size was more than three meters long and its body bigger than a basketball but she wasn’t afraid of it. Instead you can hear her “squeals of excitement” on the video.
Such an encounter is very rare as Humphreys noted that usually the creatures hide in their dens or in rocky crevices, so seeing one out in the open was a rare “mind-blowing” experience. And to get a hug by one? Humphreys, who is a school teacher, said her class was very interested to learn more about the mysterious and intelligent octopus after seeing her video.
Humphreys also said she hopes her now viral video helps people learn about the beauty of marine life and the importance of ocean-life conservation.
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