LIGHTHOUSE POINT, Fla. -- An 82-year-old man is in critical but stable condition, a day after a stingray jumped onto his boat and stabbed him in the chest, leaving a several inches of its barb stuck in him.

James Bertakis was boating with his grown granddaughter and her friend Wednesday afternoon when the rare attack occurred.

Bertakis's son, Chris, said, "The ray jumped into the boat and across my dads chest and he knocked it out of the way."

The ray reacted by slamming its barbed tail into Bertakis's chest. His son said his father then fell into the water.

"He knew if he stayed in the water he might die, so he found a way to get back, bleeding and screaming in pain," Chris Bertakis said.

The women steered the boat to shore and dialed 911. Fire-rescue workers said the spotted eagle ray died on the boat.

Bertakis underwent surgery and doctors were able to remove the barb, which appears to have lodged near or in his heart, said Dr. Eugene Costantini at Broward General Medical Center. He also had a partially collapsed lung.

"It's serrated, like a combat knife, and is extremely sharp on the point," Constantini said.

Every beat of Bertakis's heart pulled the barb deeper into his chest and almost completely through his heart, doctors said.

"It's very similar to a ratchet mechanism. Every squeeze of the heart grabs it pulls it forward and pulls it forward again," Constantini said.

Doctors were able to pull the barb through his heart and close the wound.

"We pulled it through just like a fish hook," Costantini said.

"Crocodile Hunter" Steve Irwin died last month when a stingray's barb pierced his chest while he filmed a TV show on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia.

Bertakis's case was different from that of Irwin's because the barb stayed in Bertakis' heart and was not pulled out, Costantini said.

"We're a level 1 trauma center, so we see a number of penetrating injuries to the heart," Costantini said. "I've been in practice 20 years and this is the first barb I've removed from a heart."

Bertakis's doctors said at this point they are cautiously optimistic.