US Coast Guard: Suspends Search For Missing Rig Crew

The U.S. Coast Guard said Friday it has suspended the active search for 11 missing crew members of the Transocean Ltd. (RIG) drilling rig that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico.

"We have just made a very difficult decision to suspend the search for the crew members," said Coast Guard Rear Admiral Mary Landry in a press conference in New Orleans.

Landry added that the case remained open and a search might be reactivated if there are any indications that point to survivors. Even though the Coast Guard received information from rig survivors that the missing crew members were aboard the facility and may not have escaped at the time of the explosion, it's impossible to determine their fate with "100% certainty."

The rig, known as Deepwater Horizon, was performing work for BP PLC (BP) in a deepwater prospect located about 40 miles from the Louisiana coast. The rig caught fire after an explosion late Tuesday and sank on Thursday. Even though authorities feared that the sinking may result in a major oil spill, it appears that there's no oil leaking from the deepwater well, Landry said. The Coast Guard is still closely monitoring the subsurface area around the drill site, she said.

It appears as if a blow-out preventer--a large piece of equipment that sits on the ocean floor--had activated and shut off the well, said two people who had been briefed on what a submarine had found. Landry said that "there's a presumption that the blow-out preventer may have been activated."

The Coast Guard declined to identify the missing crew because the families preferred not to have the names released, but Landry said they came from three states: Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana.

Landry said that two injured workers remained hospitalized but that one of them is likely to be released sometime Friday. The other worker will be in the hospital for about seven to 10 days, she said.

-By Angel Gonzalez, Dow Jones Newswires; 713-547-9214; angel.gonzalez@dowjones.com

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