Stunning footage has emerged of a shark flailing on shore after it beached itself chasing a seagull.

The great white shark reportedly leaped from the water in pursuit of a bird, but then couldn’t get back into the sea by itself.

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Beach goers on the coastal town of Chatham, on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, gathered around as rescuers threw water over the animal and then towed it back into the water.

“Last year we knew that sharks were in that area, and that it got shallow and it was hard for them to get out,” Cynthia Wigren from Atlantic White Shark Conservancy told news channel WCVB5.

“But for a shark to be beached, is a big deal,” she said.

Witnesses told WCVB5 it took about an hour for rescuers to get the shark to swim back into the sea on its own accord.

“There was no way for the shark to get to where it could swim, so it just kept flapping and moving over,” Kelly Skanell, a witness said.

People on the beach kept their distance from the shark but were compelled by its visit, getting their phones out to capture the rescue.

The video has been viewed more than 550,000 times in just two days.

The seven foot juvenile male shark is one of a series of recent sitings off the same beach in the past few weeks. 

However this one got a lot closer than any had been before.