Featured Image Credit: Storytrender
Shocking photographs have been captured showing a Loggerhead sea turtle stuck in a dumped fishing net.
Vincent Legrand, 42, was exploring in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean just off Pico Island in Portugal, when he came across a sea turtle who was struggling.
Upon closer examination, Vincent, from Sterrebeek, Belgium, noticed that the animal was trapped in a waste fishing net that had been dumped in the ocean.
The rope net was wrapped around the turtle’s neck, appearing to leave the animal gasping for breath.
Thankfully, Vincent was able to release the turtle, which was trapped in the three metre long net, in under two minutes after struggling to escape.
Vincent said: “The turtle was released in less than two minutes after we saw it struggle to get out.
“We took the net out of the sea and brought it back to land – we’re not sure if it was trash or a broken fishing net, but it was at least a mass of three metres long and one metre wide amongst thick garbage floating in the sea.
“We didn’t see any other fishing nets in the area, but there were many plastic bottles and other domestic trash that we could see from the boat.”
Theresa Guise found herself in a similar position when a group of divers she was with had to rescue a turtle from a large clump of fish netting.
The 60-year-old from Indianapolis, US, took pictures to show what was happening, with Theresa saying: “We were looking for blue whales in our boat when we discovered a large clump of fishnet and other material.”
She went on: “Peter de Maagt and Alex Mustard, my fellow scuba divers, and I got in the water to look at it and found a turtle trapped.
“Alex held the turtle so that it could reach the surface and easily breathe, and this also prevented it from fighting the rescue – it was panicking and thrashing about, clearly frightened.”
Peter used a knife to cut the turtle out of the netting and then Alex guided the turtle back to safety.
Peter, 55, from the Netherlands, said: “We were actually looking for whales on our boat trip when we came across the distressed turtle.
“It was, understandably, in panic mode and was flailing about making cutting it free was a bit tricky as the animal was trying to bite.