With a search-and-rescue operation continuing, senior US officials pledged yesterday that investigators would determine why a US submarine hit and sank a Japanese trawler while practising an emergency surfacing procedure.
"That's what the investigation will have to determine," the US Defence Secretary, Mr Donald Rumsfeld, said.
"It was a terrible tragedy, we know that, and there is still a search-and-rescue operation taking place to try to find the missing people."
With nine people still unaccounted for, Mr Rumsfeld said he and the Secretary of State, Gen Colin Powell, had contacted their counterparts in Japan to express regrets for the collision of the USS Greeneville and the Japanese fishing vessel, Ehime Maru, off Honolulu, in Hawaii, on Friday.
On CNN, Gen Powell promised: "We will do everything we can to find out what happened and present that information to the public."
Though hopes of finding survivors were fading, Mr Rumsfeld said the rescue operation was continuing. Coast Guard Lieut Cmdr Jack Laufer said the Coast Guard and navy would continue searching for "as long as we think there is a bit of hope".
A spokesman said two Navy aircraft, a helicopter, a C-130, and an 87-foot (26.5-metre) patrol boat were scouring the seas for survivors in a 1,400-squaremile (3,625-sq-km) area around the crash site. Late on Saturday, Cmdr Laufer said the search would continue for at least 48 hours.
Japan has urged the United States to consider raising the sunken trawler. Those missing are four 17year-old fisheries students, two of their teachers and three crew members - all of whom may have gone down with the ship.
`The first priority is the rescue of the nine missing people," the Japanese Prime Minister, Mr Yoshiro Mori, said. "If they cannot be found on the surface of the sea, we would have to address our worries and see inside the ship."
A group of some 30 Japanese family members, school officials and local government officers set off for Hawaii where they are hoping for first-hand news of the search. "There will be no information while we stay at home," said Mr Ryosuke Terata, father of Mr Yusuke Terata, one of the missing students, as he left his home. "We will go with the whole family as we believe he is still alive."
The accident comes at a delicate time for relations between the world's two largest economies and was the subject of the first major contact by the new administration of President Bush with Washington's top Asian ally.
Mr Bush expressed condolences and regret to Japan as the Navy, Coast Guard and National Transportation Safety Board launched investigations into the cause of the collision.
The US Pacific Fleet said the commander of the nuclear-powered submarine, Cmdr Scott Waddle (41), had been reassigned pending the results of the inquiry.
The Greeneville, a 360-foot (110-metre), 6,900-tonne attack submarine based at Pearl Harbor, surfaced rapidly on Friday afternoon, crashing into the 499-tonne trawler carrying 35 people, including fisheries students who were learning commercial trawling.
Within 10 minutes, the trawler sank into 1,800 feet (549 metres) of water nine miles (14 km) south of Diamond Head off Honolulu. Twenty-six people were rescued soon after the trawler went down.
Admiral Thomas Fargo, commander in chief of the US Pacific Fleet, said: `While it's not yet clear how this accident occurred, it is both tragic and regrettable. I would like to express my apologies to all of those involved in the incident, their families and the government of Japan."