Rescuers free 360kg turtle caught in net

US Coast Guards have come to the rescue of a trapped leatherback turtle that became entangled in fishing gear.

A crew in New Jersey found the 363kg creature struggling to free itself from a fishing trawl that had become wrapped around one of its flippers.

"This is the first experience where I've had to go hands on the animal to do the disentanglement," the US Coast Guard's Garrett Dailey said.

After a few focused moments of trying to manoeuvre the rope around the turtle's flipper, one of the crew finally announces: "He's free".

"The energy level was pretty high – we were all pretty excited that we were able to free the animal without any further injury to it," the Marine Mammal Stranding Centre's Jay Pagel said.

Source: YouTube