A startling video shows an alligator ramming into a kayaker and tipping him into the water

• A kayaker with a camera on his head caught footage of an alligator charging him and overturning his kayak.
• Peter Joyce uploaded the two-minute video to YouTube, where it quickly racked up hundreds of thousands of views.
• The attack could be seen roughly 50 seconds in, where the alligator shoots toward Joyce and crashes into the kayak, leaving Joyce underwater before he rights himself.
• Joyce said he was uninjured, but the incident surprised him and "made me think a little bit differently what [alligators'] capabilities are."

A kayaker paddling down a North Carolina river was flipped over and plunged into the water after an alligator rammed into him at high speed.

Peter Joyce, who had a camera on his head, caught heart-stopping footage of the entire incident and uploaded it to YouTube, where the video racked up more than 350,000 views in just two days.

The two-minute video showed Joyce paddling smoothly down the Waccamaw River for roughly 45 seconds, before the top of the alligator's head could be seen poking out of the water.

Around 50 seconds in, the gator could be seen shooting towards Joyce, then bashing into the kayak and flipping it on its side, leaving Joyce and his camera underwater.

Joyce, who told WECT he didn't see the gator until it was nearly on top of him, could be heard gasping with surprise as it crashed into him.

"I thought I heard a fish jump to my left — turned out not to be a fish," Joyce told the television station. "About three feet from the kayak I made out the head of the gator and that was it. I had no time to react."

In the video, Joyce could be heard breathing heavily after righting himself. After pausing for roughly 30 seconds while gripping the branches of a nearby tree, Joyce quickly paddled away.

Joyce told WECT he was lucky there was a tree he could use to stabilize himself, or else he might have fully inverted.

"It could've been a lot worse," he said.

It's unclear from the video where the alligator went after charging Joyce. Joyce said he wasn't injured in the incident, nor was his kayak damaged.

He added that he's seen alligators before, but never one this aggressive.

"Usually they make a splash or move and make a ruckus in the water," he told WECT. "But this was a continuous charge from about 20 feet away. It definitely made me think a little bit differently what their capabilities are."

• Read more:
• A black bear opened the front door of a Colorado home, let itself in, and attacked a man inside
• How to survive an alligator attack
• A Florida man punched an alligator in the face to save his dog from being attacked
• A manicurist was killed by an alligator following a house call during South Carolina's coronavirus lockdown