I was all in with opponent in seat one, and the muck pile was only a bit further in front of him. After we both went all-in, he flips over his hand FACE-UP on top of the muck pile. The dealer ruled his hand dead on the spot. I ended up catching my draw to win the pot anyway, but I thought it's an interesting scenario.

dealer sounds like a tre retard.

if i went all in flipped my hand up and it was near/on the muck but face up and my hand was declared dead, i wouldnt pay for sure, get banned, insta leave and never return to said casino.

Dealer is technically 100% correct, though many would let this pass as long as no one objected.

Call the floor. Terrible ruling (and/or terrible magic muck house rule), assuming the cards were face up so it was incontrovertible which cards were his. Luckily, as you say, it ended up not mattering.

This is incorrect, dealer was simply wrong (barring some weird local house rule). Once you were both all in, no more action, flipping over his hand faceup tables it, cards speak, etc. It cannot properly be killed thereafter by simply touching the muck.. Dealer should have pushed hand back to him, and treated it as a tabled hand.

Assuming this is a tourney - Unless there's a house rule stating otherwise - a dealer CAN'T really kill the hand. TDA rules state that once all action is complete hands MUST be turned up.

Except, he's not, unless the room has a specific rule about it.

The muck is a graveyard, not the gallows.

Without being there, how do you know the dealer was correct?

The OP said he hand was face up in the muck, was it completely in the muck pile or was a corner touching the muck? I don't know either. But I know that if two players are all in, just because all or part of his hand touches the muck pile, I'm not killing that hand.

If the other player wants to try to angle shoot his way into winning a pot when he had the worst hand, I would call the floor who would explain that the hand was live.

Interesting theory. What do you base it on?

Based on the short description of events, the player's intention was to table his hand, not throw it away. It is face up. He has shown his hand. Cards speak.

It would have no doubt turned very ugly if this player had the best hand and it was ruled dead.

As it's been stated in this forum many times, the muck is not some all powerful black hole in which nothing shall return. Why players & dealers treat it as such is baffling (aside from angle shooters).

If I was new to the room and wasn't sure after this hand, I'd still get up after a bit, seek out a floor and ask, "Is this room one of the last 6 rooms in the world where cards touching the muck automatically kills the hand? If not, you really need provide some additional training to the dealer at table X."

The dealer is an idiot. My question is, if the dealer killed the hand "on the spot", why did he even bother running out the rest of the board? What would it matter at that point?

I've wondered about this before. Sometimes at showdown I flip over my cards and one or both of them slide into the muck face up. It's never been a problem, but I think I'd be pretty pissed if they killed a face up hand at showdown.

I'll clarify a couple things. I didn't consider it an issue when he tabled his hand onto the muck pile so I wasn't angle shooting. The dealer actually just stared at his cards and frowned but dealt turn/river. Afterwards she told him the hand was dead right there since he "threw it in the muck" but she didn't wanna rub it in cuz he lost anyway.

It's also surprising (after reading your comments) that most at the table agreed with the dealer. Although opponent said "I'd have thrown the biggest fit in the world if I actually won", to which the dealer replied "you can throw all the fit you want but the floor would've ruled it dead and you'd have been escorted out".

Yikes, anyway, for future reference, just stay away from the muck pile I'd say!

P.S. He had AA and raised to $10 pre. C-bet to which I raised with A7 with NFD on 10 7 3 flop (I was sure he didn't have a set), he 3bet AI and I called. It was 1/2 and pot ended up over $400. I rivered the flush.