NEED TO KNOW
- Photographer Vika Plotnikova unexpectedly plunged into a pond during a couple’s wedding ceremony when she was “trying to get the perfect angle for the shot”
- Luckily, her camera didn’t get wet, so Plotnikova climbed out of the pond and continued to shoot the remainder of the celebration
- “We all had a laugh about it,” Plotnikova tells PEOPLE
A wedding photographer took an “unplanned swim” when she suddenly fell into a pond.
Immediately after groom Jake and bride Christoni shared their first kiss as husband and wife during their July 11 wedding ceremony at Como Park Zoo & Conservatory’s Sunken Garden in Saint Paul, Minnesota, their photographer, Vika Plotnikova, lost her balance and fell into the venue’s pond.
“Right after it happened, I was in shock — I could hardly believe what had just happened,” Plotnikova tells PEOPLE.
Plotnikova explains that she was standing “right at the corner of the pond” because she was “trying to get the perfect angle for the shot.”
“The moment I felt myself starting to lose balance, I realized there was no way to fall backward — I had to think about saving my camera. So, I quickly shifted my foot, almost as if I was going to step into the pond,” she says. “I was pretty sure it wasn’t deep and thought I could just step in like into a puddle, and no one would even notice. But it turned out to be much deeper — I ended up going in almost up to my head!”
The bride and groom, along with their 26 loved ones present for the family-only ceremony, audibly gasped when Plotnikova splashed into the surprisingly deep water.
Plotnikova wasn’t worried about being embarrassed. Instead, her focus was on saving her camera. She had held the equipment high above her head, which was inches away from being underwater. Luckily, when she checked the camera after climbing out of the pond, “it was completely fine.” So, she immediately got back to work.
“Since the ceremony had just ended, nothing was interrupted, and I was able to keep photographing the rest of the day as planned,” Plotnikova says. “It turned into a funny memory we all carried with us, but it didn’t stop me from doing my job for even a moment.”
The newlyweds and their guests were “incredibly kind and caring,” and repeatedly checked on Plotnikova to make sure she was okay.
“Once it was clear I was fine, we all had a laugh about it, and joked that at least I wasn’t overheating in that summer heat anymore,” Plotnikova says.
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After the wedding, Plotnikova shared a video of her fall into the pond on TikTok and it quickly went viral, amassing more than 900,000 views and nearly 120,000 likes. “That’s me, and I know how to make your wedding unforgettable,” she wrote in an onscreen caption.
To her surprise, her comments sections and messages were flooded with similar stories from other photographers, “the funniest part” being that a few had fallen in the exact same pond.
“I laugh every time I think about it,” Plotnikova reflects. “It’s definitely an example of how far I’ll go to get the perfect shot — even if it means an unplanned swim. Now I always keep a spare set of clothes in the car, just in case.”
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