A Kiwi man living on a small Singaporean island has captured amazing footage of a turtle being rescued from a fishing net.
Scott Tucker told 1News he was jet skiing on Lazarus Island when he noticed the 1.5-metre-long turtle intertwined in the net, trying to get free.
"I rode towards the beach and as I was riding I saw a line approaching and thought maybe a swimming net had been put up, it was going from one side of the bay to the another, about 100 metres long."
Tucker said he then realised it was a fishing net, not a swimming net. He said it wasn't drifting at all, "it was stretched quite taut".
"I looked back along the line and saw this thing flapping so I turned around and realised it was quite a large sea turtle and it had got itself tangled up and was flapping around in a bit of a panic trying to get out.
"It wasn't good, and without a knife I couldn't set it free so I stopped the jet ski and called back to marina."
Tucker said he then spoke to a skipper on a nearby yacht, who had a knife and a snorkel and offered to help set the turtle free.
"He got on the back of my jet ski and we rode over to where the turtle was and Andrew [the skipper] just jumped straight in.
"The turtle started freaking out and tried to swim to the bottom so I had to get the jet ski and go over and pull the net up so that it was at the surface, while Andrew was able to cut the line off the turtle's fins and its neck."
He said it took a while but the turtle was eventually set free.
Later, they found a bluespotted ribbontail stingray, that had also found itself stuck in the net.
Tucker removed the fishing net from the water, which he thinks was put there illegally. He has reported the incident to the Maritime Ports Authority.
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