Jason Momoa may play Aquaman on the big screen, but even he admits the ocean nearly claimed his life during a harrowing real-life surfing nightmare.
In a shocking confession on the Smartless podcast, the 46-year-old actor revealed he almost drowned while surfing some of Maui’s most dangerous waves — and the only thing that kept him alive was the thought of his baby daughter.
“It felt like my body just shut down,” Momoa said, recalling the terrifying moment in 2007 when he was caught in powerful currents at a notorious break nicknamed “Jaws,” where waves regularly tower over 10 feet. “I literally gave up. I was screaming inside.”
Momoa, a native Hawaiian and former Baywatch lifeguard, was paddling with friends when he drifted nearly half a mile off the coast into a stretch locals ominously call “Stfks.”
“I was stuck in this crazy spot,” he recalled. “I had my paddle, I was waving it… but my buddies couldn’t see me. The waves were just too big.”
As panic set in, he thought of Lola Iolani, the then-3-month-old daughter he shares with ex Lisa Bonet.
“That’s when I just lost it,” he said. “My body stopped. Like I couldn’t move my arms anymore… I gave up on my life.”
A friend eventually spotted him, but the nightmare wasn’t over. Brutal waves separated them from their boards, and raging currents made it nearly impossible to get back to shore.
“My feet are covered in blood, and I’m just paddling the rest of the way with my ancestors,” he said. “Head down. I just died out there and came back.”
The terrifying brush with death didn’t just shake him physically — it transformed him mentally and emotionally, too.
Momoa revealed the incident inspired him to quit smoking cold turkey after years of being unable to kick the habit.
“I used to smoke two or three packs a day. I couldn’t stop for my kids, I couldn’t stop for my ex… but the moment I came out [of the water], I never smoked again.”
Fans have long admired Momoa’s intense energy and action-star persona, but this raw moment of vulnerability reminds us that even the strongest among us have breaking points — and sometimes, all it takes is the thought of someone you love to fight your way back from the edge.
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