Rescuers freed a stranded green sea turtle after it was found tangled on a fishing net.

Volunteers rode speedboats and rushed to rescue the hefty 20kg reptile stuck on a fisherman's seine some 50 metres off the coast of Nakhon Si Thammarat province, Thailand, on September 26.

Tourists called authorities when they found the creature floating near the Nai Plao beach with its flippers trapped in the net.

Officers cut off a portion of the seine and brought the turtle back to shore, where they worked on disentangling the net covering its body.

After 30 minutes, the sea animal was finally freed and released back into the sea.

Parunchai Jaisabai, chief of the Parunchai Rescue Foundation, said: 'The green sea turtle might have been stuck in the floating seine for one or two hours before the tourists found it and called the rescuers for help.'