Meet the injured sea turtle given a third chance at life

An injured loggerhead sea turtle has been nursed back to health and returned to the wild after being washed up - and it turns out it isn't for the first time.

The species gets its name from their large heads and powerful jaws, which allow them to crush their hard-shelled prey, like clams.

This particular sea turtle, Nazare, washed up on a beach in Barrow-in-Furness in Cumbria and was helped by a team at Sea Life Blackpool.

Nazare has a microchip fitted to her shell which helped the team find out she had also been stranded in France last year.

When Nazare was found in Cumbria she had been cold-stunned - this is when a turtle becomes weak due to rapidly cooling waters.

She also had a load of algae and seaweed covering her shell, which had to be cleaned off using a toothbrush.

The team in Blackpool cared for her, monitored her condition and made some floats to help support her in the water.

When her condition improved and she was able to eat and move independently, she was moved to another team at Sea Life Scarborough for further help.

Todd German, who is the curator at Sea Life Scarborough, drove Nazare to Scarborough, he said they "were closely monitoring her behaviour, her actions, her feeding, even how often she was pooping".

Once they were happy she was fit and healthy they needed to get her a special turtle passport before flying her to the Azores which are a series of islands in the mid Atlantic which are Portuguese.

But before Nazare was released into the wild, she had one final temporary stop at an aquarium in the country.

Mr German said that her rehabilitation was a lot quicker than it could have been, as the team learned "loads of lessons" from when they helped a different turtle last year.