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The missing yacht was expected to arrive in Subic Bay in the Philippines by Monday. Photo: SCMP Pictures

Search widens for Hong Kong yacht sailing for Philippines with 4 crew still missing

The Hong Kong Yacht Club has officially identified the five crew members still missing on the Phillipines-bound yacht as authorities continue the search for any clues following the discovery of a body of one of the crew on Tuesday. 

The search for the missing Hong Kong-registered yacht Europa continued on Thursday but no sign of the vessel has yet been detected, according to the city's Marine Department and the Philippine Coast Guard.

A spokeswoman for the department said a fixed-wing plane from Hong Kong’s Government Flying Service was again deployed during the day to the area where the yacht was last spotted, about 310 nautical miles southeast of Hong Kong.

“The scope of the search has been widened today because it has to follow the direction of water flows,” the spokeswoman said. She was not at liberty to detail the parameters of the new search area.

The Philippine Coast Guard said it was also continuing its search in the area.

The yacht was carrying five people – two Britons, one Canadian, one American and a Filipino – when it left Hong Kong for Subic Bay in the Philippines last Thursday. It was supposed to arrive at its destination on Monday.

Search efforts were further frustrated earlier when a device on board the yacht that can help rescuers locate its whereabouts stopped transmitting.

A joint Hong Kong-Philippine search has found nothing so far except a floating body and a life jacket near where the boat was last spotted.

The Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club said on Wednesday that Hong Kong's Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre, a unit under the Marine Department, had confirmed that the yacht's emergency position-indicating radio beacon had stopped transmitting.

The beacon is a safety device to alert search and rescue services and allow them to locate vessels that encounter trouble.

"The Hong Kong-registered 18.2-metre Europa was on a delivery trip from Hong Kong to Subic Bay, Philippines, when she ran into difficulties, activating the [device] on Saturday," the club said in a statement.

Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Commander Armand Balilo said an unidentified floating body and a life jacket had been found.

He told Manila-based television network ABS-CBN that the yacht probably sank some 220 nautical miles off the coast of Laoag City in the northern Philippines due to bad weather. Traces of oil were spotted in the water, he added.

Over the weekend, Typhoon Mujigae - the strongest storm to strike the mainland province of Guangdong this month - swept through the South China Sea.

Skipper Robin Wyatt

One fixed-wing aircraft from Hong Kong and another from the Philippines were later dispatched to look for the yacht, according to the club. Ships in the area were also put on alert.

The yacht is new and all of the five crew on board were described by the club as "experienced seamen". Each of the seamen had crossed the South China Sea a number of times, it said.

The five on board were Britons Robin Wyatt and Brian Turner, Canadian Harry Taylor, American Alan Lundy, and Filipino Rudolph Bollozos, with Wyatt as the yacht's skipper.

The Marine Department said immediately after the centre received a signal of an emergency positioning radio beacon, it co-ordinated with the Government Flying Service to search the yacht's location.

Two days later, on Monday, the centre was informed that a Hong Kong-registered yacht with five persons on board missed their estimated time of arrival in the Philippines.

Reached by phone yesterday, the Philippine Coast Guard said it had no updates and the Philippine office of Europa Yachts declined to comment.

READ MORE: Doctor, 51, dies after falling into sea from yacht at Aberdeen

Additional reporting by Ng Kang-chung

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: Device that could locate missing yacht stops working
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