A 20ft-long dealy cobra sparked panic after it was caught slithering through a family’s home.

Sadit Namsai was startled when he heard his neighbour shouting that a cobra had entered his house in Nakhon Si Thammarat province, Thailand on February 20.

The shocked house owner kept calm and let the 23kg reptile dart behind his old cabinet before calling the animal rescuers for help.

When the rescue team arrived, they checked behind the furniture and tried to lure the snake out.

However, the animal evaded the volunteers and squeezed itself into the small gaps to escape into the other room in the house.

It hid inside a bigger cabinet where it was found by rescuers who used a pole to force it out.

The defiant snake refused to move out of the furniture until the rescuer found an opening to pin its neck down while his colleague pulled its tail out.

After almost half an hour, the snake was extracted from its hiding space before four team members helped secure it in a sack.

Relieved house owner Said thanked the rescuers before they drove off with the snake to be released into the wild.

He said: ‘It was the biggest cobra I have ever seen. I am thankful that it was removed from my house and no one was hurt.’