KEY WEST, FL — A massive 170-pound loggerhead sea turtle nicknamed “Molly” was back home in the warm waters of the Florida Keys Tuesday after a successful surgery to remove a life-threatening tumor inches from her head and months of recovery that have gone viral on social media.

In August, a charter fisherman found Molly, an approximately 25- to 30-year-old loggerhead, trapped by commercial fishing lines tethering her to a crab trap. The fishermen noticed the lines were tangled around an enormous tumor near the left side of Molly’s head.

Molly after her surgery.

Juliette Arcodia / NBC News

“She had multiple tumors, but that 10.1-pound tumor is what was really threatening her life,” said Bette Zirkelbach, manager of The Turtle Hospital, a small nonprofit organization working to rehab

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