A Humpback whale freed after becoming entangled in ropes in Sydney Harbour.

Jessica Fox, the second vice-president of volunteer organization Orrca, confirmed the rescue operation late Friday morning.

The young adult whale, between 10 and 15 metres long, was spotted around 1pm on Thursday by a tour group, who alerted Orrca.

A GPS tracker was reportedly attached to the whale on Thursday before rescue efforts were halted overnight. However, the tracker became detached and the whale had to be relocated on Friday morning.

At 9:30 a.m., according to a video posted to Orrca’s Facebook page, the mammal was between Middle Head and North Head. The group reported a “tangle (of) ropes and buoys attached to (its) tail.”

New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Service and Maritime NSW had vessels on site monitoring the whale and enforcing an exclusion zone, a spokesperson for the former said.

The large whale rescue team was sent to help free the animal.

Wildlife officers used special cutting equipment to free the whale from ropes wrapped around its tail. The equipment consisted of a long pole with blades that do not touch the whale when cutting the rope.

“It’s clearly a very complicated operation,” Ben Khan, the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service’s area manager, said at a news conference.

“We have a live animal. It’s very, very big.

“The entanglement was around its tail… it’s a fairly simple entanglement, but it was a very active animal. So it had to be done very carefully this morning.”

The rescue team worked from 6:30 am to 11:15 am.

“It took many attempts to get to the whale, to slow down to a safe speed and get close enough to make that safe cut,” Khan said.

The humpback whale swam towards the Sydney Heads and the open ocean after being cut loose.

With thanks to Australian Associated Press.