It was Father’s Day and the first official day of summer — and the Frickman family were enjoying their time on their small boat off Dana Point Harbor in California. Scores of happy dolphins swam alongside their boat.

But their peace soon turned to panic when one of the dolphins leapt up and fell into their boat, landing on top of Chrissie Frickman and breaking both of her ankles.

“It hit my wife and knocked her over, and punched my daughter,” Dirk Frickman told the Orange County Register. “I had this 350-pound dolphin in my boat. There was no way to get it off the boat.”

Frickman called the OC Sheriff’s Department Harbor Patrol on the radio as he rushed the boat back to the harbor, and the officer came out to meet them. After getting Chrissie and their two kids safely onto the Harbor Patrol boat, Frickman stayed on the boat to splash water on the thrashing dolphin, bloodied with cuts on its nose and tail.

Two dock workers and Frickman tied a rope around the dolphin, pulled it up onto the dock, then untied the rope and released it back into the water. Frickman notes that “the dolphin was hopefully saved. It swam away with no problem.”

Chrissie Frickman is now recovering from her broken angles, and her husband is taking time from work to take care of her. Though the event was scary, Dirk notes that it was overall a good lesson in safety.

“It’s one of those things where it’s all so beautiful, but you have to remember it’s still kind of wild,” Frickman told the OC Register. “From seven years watching them, dolphins have been so precise in their movements, but you just never know. Maybe you want to stay a bit farther away.”