U.S. searchers find empty lifeboat from freighter lost in Pacific hurricane

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) -- The U.S. Coast Guard located a battered, empty lifeboat from a 338-foot Lithuanian freighter with 18 people aboard that vanished during a Pacific hurricane last week, an official said Monday.

"It was found this morning, capsized and pretty beat-up," said Petty Officer Tyler Johnson, a spokesman for the Coast Guard. "We know that these things don't launch themselves, so it must have been launched in the storm."

Johnson said the discovery of the lifeboat about 330 miles west of Acapulco, Mexico, would help narrow the search for the MV Linkuva, which was reported missing on June 20 after its main engine broke down in the middle of Hurricane Carlotta.

When the Linkuva lost power, Carlotta was a Category 4 hurricane with sustained winds of 150 mph. The freighter is owned by Klaipeda Transport Fleet Ltd. and was heading to Long Beach, California. A Category 4 storm can cause extreme damage.

Johnson said that ships, helicopters and aircraft from the U.S. Coast Guard and the U.S. and Mexican navies would continue to scour the area at least through Tuesday.

"We are looking for anything," Johnson said. "Really what we're looking for are people in a life raft ... but also for debris."

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