This is the gruesome moment a gargantuan 14ft-long king cobra dangling from a family's ceiling was caught in southern Thailand.

The serpent entered through the small gap between the wall and the roof to hunt a pet bird kept at the back of a resident's home in Phatthalung province on February 1.

But before the massive snake could catch its prey, one of the residents spotted its huge body coiled around the beams and called the rescuers for help.

Footage shows the venomous creature looping its thick body around the pole connected to a makeshift clothesline. It engaged the responding rescuers in a fierce tug-of-war until it was removed from the house.

The snake's head was secured on a noose so it couldn't open its mouth and bite before the snake wrangles posed outside with it,.

Onlooker Sermsak Chusang said: ‘My neighbour's pet bird was housed at the back. We think it was trying to eat the poor little bird. It was shaking. This was the longest snake we've seen here.'

As it was too long, the volunteers were already out of the house dragging its head but more than half of its body remained wrapped around the pole.

Three volunteers and some of the neighbours helped secure the animal. It was measured and placed inside a sack.

One of the rescuers said: ‘The cobra was a female and entered through the roof. It was released back into the forest away from the communities.'

No one was hurt but house owner Rokaya Maimad, 48, said she would begin repairing the holes in their home to make it safer from wild animal intruders.

She said: ‘If that big snake existed, who knows if it had siblings or parents lurking around our village.'

Researchers found that 7,000 people are treated for snake bites each year in Thailand. Suchai Suteparuk from the Division of Toxicology at Chulalongkorn University reported that 30 of those die, with cobras being the biggest killer.