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“Aquaman” and “Chief of War” star Jason Momoa went on “Smartless” Monday, where he told the harrowing story of a near-death surfing experience at the Jaws surf break in Maui. At the time, the actor didn’t think he would make it out alive.
“We paddled 13 miles down the coast, and you’re kind of almost a mile offshore, and then my leash snapped,” Momoa recalled of his trip with friends. “It’s so windy on Maui, and so the board just went. I couldn’t even see it anymore.”
He sat down with “Smartless” hosts Will Arnett, Jason Bateman and Sean Hayes to discuss his career amid the premiere season of his new Apple TV+ project, “Chief of War.” Roughly 17 minutes into the episode, Momoa talked about the nearly fatal trip that changed his life.
“Wait, so tell me, when you’re in that position of almost drowning, what is your brain … you know it’s happening. Do you have a protocol of what to do in that moment? Are you even thinking clearly enough to know how to save yourself?” Hayes asked.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, well, I was trained pretty well, so it was fine. So it was just, I took quite a few on the head. They were pretty big, like 10-foot Hawaiian waves, but I’m literally probably a mile offshore,” Momoa said. “It’s actually, this place is called S–tf–ks, and it’s literally because there’s all this water that pulls out, and it just pulls you out and you just get hit with these waves. So I was stuck in this crazy spot, which is probably the outer reef, and unknown to me, I was really on the outer reef, and they couldn’t see me, and I had my paddle and I was waving it, and they couldn’t see me.”
“The waves were so big, it was basically, it took my shorts off they were so f–king big,” Momoa continued.
“‘Shorts off at S–tf–ks.’ I’m pretty sure that’s in the Village,” Bateman quipped.
Momoa thought of his daughter, who was three months old at the time. The former Aquaman and future Lobo said he remained in the water long enough that he could no longer move his arms or legs.
“I literally gave up and I’m screaming inside, and my foot just hits the outer reef, and I don’t know if it was a f–king whale or like just could be one rock, but I just reached down, grabbed it, I jump up, I get hit by another wave,” he said. “I dig my feet into the coral and I’m literally in the middle of the ocean, and I’m just, I could barely put my lips above it just to breathe and get a break, but I had already given up, so it’s like, you’ve already given up and died and have a second chance at it.”
Momoa said he stayed in this spot for another 10 minutes before his friend rode in on his surfboard, the other board in tow. Momoa also spoke about the journey home, with his feet covered in blood, trying to go over the waves.
In fact, the actor said it’s the only thing that’s ever gotten him to quit smoking.
“I used to smoke like two, three packs a day. I had a roller pouch. I couldn’t stop for my kids, I couldn’t stop for my ex, I couldn’t stop smoking,” he admitted. “The moment I came out, I never smoked again. I just died. I just died. I tried and tried, but I couldn’t do it again because I just, I gave up. Like, I gave up my life.”
