Video shows beachgoers help rescue stranded great white shark

Families on an American beach had a rare close encounter with a great white shark when it stranded itself on the sand.

Video courtesy Mike Bartel

Witnesses told local media the shark beached itself as the seven-foot (two metre) long juvenile male tried to catch seagulls off the Chatham coast.

Amateur video showed a harbormaster and another man splashing water on the animal before a rope was tied around the shark's rear fin and it was towed it out to sea at Chatham, Massachusetts.

Curious bystanders applauded as officials managed to successfully release the shark back into the ocean.