Hatching leatherback turtles get helping hand on Thai beach

IT is past midnight on a beach in southern Thailand and 12-year-old Prin Uthaisangchai is anxiously staring at a leatherback turtle nest, waiting for scores of the endangered hatchlings to scrabble out from the sand.

The Bangkok secondary school pupil is producing a short documentary about the snappers, under a programme run by the Environmental and Social Foundation (ESF), a civil society group working to educate children about conservation.