Rescuers in south-central Vietnam have successfully rescued a live dolphin that was exhausted and drifted ashore.

On Thursday afternoon, while patrolling along the beach on Tran Phu Street in the coastal city of Nha Trang, two rescuers of the Management Board of Nha Trang Bay – Lam Quoc Du and Nguyen Thanh Sanh – noticed a dolphin that was being pushed ashore by waves.

The dolphin is more than 2 meters long and weighs about 200 kg, the rescuers said.

Seeing the animal too tired to swim, Du and Thanh rushed to it and tried to save the dolphin by holding the mammal under water so that it could not sink or be swept away by sea waves.

About an hour later, the dolphin showed signs of recovery and the two rescuers released the animal which then swam back to the sea.

A similar salvage took place in Nui Thanh District, central Quang Nam Province on August 30 last year, when an injured dolphin was discovered lying along the coast by local residents.

The dolphin measured over 2 meters in length and weighed about 200kg.

Locals created a makeshift pond for the animal to live in temporarily at the beach.At 4:30 pm the same day, the animal recovered and local residents put it on a piece of canvas and released the animal back into the deep water.