IT DIDN'T take a website to reunite two old friends.

Arthur Ruffell, curator at Blackpool Tower aquarium, first met Molokai when the sea turtle was just a three inch long hatchling.

Arthur, 54, had to delicately hand feed the young turtle for several weeks after he first arrived at the tower in 1982, but, slowly but surely, Molokai grew to be a metre long and weighs 20 stone.

He outgrew his tank at the tower, but, after a spell in Brighton, Molokai has now found a permanent home at the new National Sea Life Centre in Brighton, where a plaque was unveiled this week to mark Arthur's work with turtles.

"He was so tiny and helpless when he first arrived," said Arthur: "and it was such a triumph to keep him alive, it was impossible not to develop a real affection for him."

Molokai, along with his younger, larger cousin, Gulliver, is based in a new display designed to mimic the seas around Hawaii, a display they share with black-tipped reef sharks and colourful tropical fish. They are already rivalling the attraction's three resident otters for popularity and, said curator, Josie Sutherland: "Everyone here at the centre fell under Molokai's spell within hours of his introduction to the ocean tank.

"Arthur obviously did a marvellous job of rearing him and we're not surprised he misses him."

Originally from County Durham, Arthur, who also worked for four years at Nutbrown Engineering in Bispham and later at Glasdon Signs, but spent 12 years in the Royal Navy as a chef.

"In 12 years in the navy, and despite seeing every continent except Australia, I only ever saw one turtle.

"Just off Antigua," he recalls: "Little did I suspect..."