Time now ‘critical’ in search for submarine
ARGENTINA: The search for an Argentine navy submarine missing in the South Atlantic for a week reached a ‘‘critical phase’’ yesterday as the 44 crew on board could be running low on oxygen, a navy spokesman said.
Dozens of planes and boats were searching for the ARA San Juan, a mission that has plunged relatives of the sailors into an anguished wait for news and transfixed the South American country of 44 million people.
If the German-built submarine, in service for more than three decades, had sunk or was otherwise unable to rise to the surface since it gave its last location on November 15, it would be using up the last of its seven-day oxygen supply.
‘‘We are in the critical phase ... particularly with respect to oxygen,’’ navy spokesman Enrique Balbi said. ‘‘There has been no contact with anything that could be the San Juan submarine.’’
Relatives of the crew members have gathered at a naval base in Mar del Plata, where the search is co-ordinated. Their concern grew as the hours ticked by.
The craft was probably on the seabed because the mechanism to surface either failed or was not activated by a crew member, naval investigator Fernando Morales said.
‘‘If the captain stayed at the bottom because he thought it was more prudent to stay at the bottom, it’s one thing. But at this point we have to think that if he’s at the bottom, it’s because he could not emerge,’’ Morales said.
Balbi said an unusual noise was detected on November 15, near where the submarine last reported its position. He declined to say if the sound indicated an explosion or emergency on the vessel.
Favourable weather allowed search boats to cover a greater area after being hampered by strong winds and waves for much of the past few days, Balbi said. Poor weather was expected to return today.
Around 30 boats and planes and
4000 people from Argentina, the United States, Britain, Chile and Brazil have joined the search for the submarine, which last transmitted its location about
480km from the coast. Planes have covered some
500,000 square kilometres of the ocean surface, but much of the area has not yet been scoured by the boats.
Argentines have been gripped by the search, with local newspapers placing photographs on their front pages of crew members’ relatives praying.
The submarine was en route from Ushuaia, the southernmost city in the world, to the coastal city of Mar del Plata, some 400km south of Buenos Aires, when it reported an electrical malfunction shortly before disappearing last week.