The cobra, weighing around 10 kilograms, was captured at a house in the Nong Talay area (also spelled “Nong Thale”).
Local resident Sakda Srimard, 60, called Ao Nang Rescue after his son raised the alarm.
‘‘My son found the king cobra outside our house trying to eat a cat,” Mr Sakda said.
However, the son frightened the snake away, sparing the cat from its encounter with the huge snake, which slid off to hide in a wood pile near the house, he added.
“I called my neighbours to come and surround the wood pile to prevent the snake from escaping and I called the rescue team to come and catch it,” he said.
Rescue worker Sutee Naewhad, 37, was the first to lay hands on the snake.
‘‘I was searching the wood pile and using a torch to see it (in the dark spaces between the pieces of wood), and saw its tail near the wall,” Mr Sutee explained.
“I grabbed the tail and tried to pull it out, but it got away and slid deeper into the wood pile,” he added.
After lifting some of the wood from the pile in a game of hide and seek taking some 20 minutes, Mr Sutee finally got his hands on the snake again, and with some help from fellow rescue workers placed the king cobra safely into a sack.
“Catching a snake with your bare hands is not hard, but you have to be brave and think about safety first,” Mr Sutee said.
“You have to handle them gently. If you grab them hard, they will bite you,” he added.
Mr Sutee explained that he chooses to catch snakes bare-handed not to show off.
“If we use equipment to catch them, the snake will be injured,” he said.