British Columbia scuba diver Andrea Humphreys’ new acquaintance greeted her more like a long-lost friend, with outstretched arms, then a full-body hug and finally a lip-to-tentacle kiss. Ms Humphreys’ “exciting” encounter was with a giant Pacific octopus. The teacher’s video of the rare moment with the creature, at a depth of three meters off the Campbell River on Vancouver Island, has gone viral. “I have been diving for 12 years. I never had that. It was just shocking and it was so incredible,” said Ms Humphreys, who has done more than 675 dives around the world but describes her interaction with the octopus as the experience of a lifetime. On October 15, Ms Humphreys and two other locals were with a fifth diver who had never seen an octopus on a dive. “So our goal was to find this person an octopus and we got ready and got in the water. And within three minutes, I found this octopus just sitting there in the open,” Ms Humphreys said. Mrs Humphreys and her friends tried to give the octopus some space while taking pictures. He estimated its size at more than three meters, tentacle to tentacle, with a body larger than a basketball. But the octopus had other ideas. It began crawling towards Ms Humphreys’ friend who had never seen an octopus before, then greeted Ms Humphreys with its body and tentacles completely engulfing her camera. “His tentacles were reaching through the camera to feel my face and then at some point he had crawled up my body, onto my hips and was hugging me,” she said. “And he had tentacles over and around my mouth and he was sucking on my lip, which is the only exposed part of my body,” said Ms Humphreys, who captured the whole interaction on video, with her “squeals of excitement. “ He said such close interaction with divers is rare from a giant Pacific octopus, which scientists classify as highly intelligent. “This was definitely not a normal octopus encounter,” Ms Humphreys said. “Typically, when we find octopuses, they are in their hiding places, like hiding in small cracks, crevices, under rocks and open logs. So it was very rare to leave it open.” Ms Humphreys said she hoped the story of her encounter would raise awareness of the beauty of marine life and the importance of protecting the underwater environment. She said students in her class found the video and asked her questions about it, “so the excitement is definitely there.” “[I’m] I just hope that I can make people, through this video, aware of what lives under the sea and how our impacts can be so harmful.” Ms Humphreys said she was looking forward to visiting the same dive site again, hoping to find the octopus again to renew their acquaintance. This content appears as provided to The Globe by the original wire service. It has not been edited by Globe staff.
