Hope in search for missing sub

AN ARGENTINE submarine remained missing last night despite officials detecting seven satellite signals thought to have been sent by the stricken crew.

Search efforts to find the vessel off the country’s southern Atlantic coast were doubled amid rising fears about the fate of the 44 submariners on-board.

The Royal Navy deployed HMS Protector, an ice patrol ship, to help search for the ARA San Juan, and offered up a C130 Hercules aircraft stationed in the Falkland Islands.

Falklands Islands patrol vessel HMS Clyde is returning from a patrol to South Georgia to assist if needed.

A Navy statement said: ‘High winds and heavy seas in the South Atlantic are affecting the ability of assets to conduct operations but the UK remains committed to efforts to find the missing submarine as soon as possible.’

Navy command last had contact with the diesel-electric sub on Wednesday, when it disappeared 430 kilometres ( 67 miles) off the coast as it returned from a routine mission.

On Saturday, Argentine defence minister Oscar Aguad said officials had received seven signals from satellite calls that officials believe may have come from the submarine. The communication attempts ‘indicate that the crew is trying to re-establish contact, so we are working to locate the source of the emissions’, the Argentine navy posted on Twitter. It added that the calls lasted between four and 36 seconds.

Mr Aguad tweeted: ‘We are working hard to locate it and we are transmitting hope to the families of the 44 crew members: that they’ll soon be able to have them in their homes.’

The Argentine navy believes the submarine had communication difficulties that may have been caused by an electrical outage, according to spokesman Enrique Balbi.

Navy protocol would call for the submarine to come to the surface once communication was lost.

Mr Balbi said the area being searched off the country’s southern Atlantic coast has been doubled as concerns about the crew’s fate grew.