Argentina ’s navy has launched a huge search-and-rescue operation for a military submarine with 44 crew members that has been missing off the coast of Patagonia for more than two days.
The last radio contact with the San Juan submarine was on Wednesday, when it was 430km off the coast of the southern province of Chubut, in the area of San Jorge bay, the navy said on Friday.
Navy spokesman Enrique Balbi told local television that since there was no indication of a problem with the submarine, it could not yet be considered lost.
“The latest official and reliable information is that the submarine has not yet been found. It’s not that it’s lost: to be lost you’d have to look for it – and not find it,” he said. A tracker aeroplane and navy ships were scouring the area in search of the missing vessel, he said.
An initial search in an area around the sub’s last known position, about 430km off the south-eastern Valdez peninsula, provided no clues.
