The family of a New Zealander who was onboard the cattle ship that sank in the East China Sea say they've received information that survivors may still be found.
Lochie Bellerby is a herd manager on board the Gulf Lifestock 1 and has not been located since the ship hit a typhoon last week.
The Japanese Coast Guard has called off its full-time search, with 40 crew members still unaccounted for.
"The latest information we have heard - this come from the interview with one of the surviving Filipinos - and we hadn't heard this interview until last night," Lochie's father Guy Bellerby told Checkpoint.
"We're in contact with Australian friends and what has come to light is that he was washed overboard, as everyone was preparing to get into a life boat.
"But now there's four life rafts missing, and one life boat missing. There's also been, in the whole search area after picking up two survivors and another Filipino who has since died, we expect to either find bodies or other debris that would indicate where the other survivors were, and there's been nothing.
"So we're hoping that they're all in that lifeboat somewhere or on the life raft because they're unaccounted for," Guy Bellerby said.
"The Japanese have done an amazing job searching and finding the two survivors so far. But we wonder with horrible winds and tides and the currents, whether the search should be further afield, and there's lots of uninhabited islands in this area that are quite leafy so it's not like a desert island with one tree on it. And we wondered, we are hoping that they could be on these islands, or bobbing about in the China Sea.
"It's a large area and they could be a thousand kilometres away by now, so we don't know, which is why we would like the search to be recommenced on a wider scale."
Lochie's mother, Lucy, told Checkpoint the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade have been a tremendous help.
"So we get fed any information that the Japanese Coast Guard has on hand to MFAT and then to ourselves, and the family of the other New Zealander.
"We're also in correspondence with Maritime New Zealand who also rings us daily. So any questions we have had we put to them and they come back with information as fast as they can."
A Filipino crew member believed to be onboard Gulf Livestock 1, a cargo ship carrying livestock and dozens of crew members that went missing after issuing a distress signal due to Typhoon Maysak, is rescued by a Japan Coast Guard boat during their search and rescue operation at the East China Sea, to the west of Amami Oshima island in southwestern Japan, in this handout photo taken on September 2, 2020 and provided by Japan Coast Guard. Photo: Japan Coast Guard/Reuters
But she said she does not know what needs to be done to get the search underway again.
"I've talked to MFAT today, we're just gathering more details. We have a marine specialist helping us at the moment so we needed more information, for example, coordinates of where the distress signal was, where the survivors were picked up, et cetera.
"I actually don't know. This is our next big question with the information that we now know, where do we go next?"
Lochie's parents are urging the government to help restart the search.
"There are 40 people out there unaccounted for, and we're doing this not just for us, for Lochie, who we would so dearly love home as any parent could imagine when you lose, or have a son missing at sea. We're doing this for the other New Zealand family, the two Australian families, and also for all the Filipino families... we all have sons missing at sea. We're doing it for everybody, we would love some help," Lucy said.
"I know the Australians are starting to make a small move. The momentum is just starting today. We would really appreciate any support we can get from the government."
She said they last heard from Lochie the day before the boat went missing.
Photo: Japan Coast Guard
"He was talking about the sea conditions and how rough it was. Also he was describing the tilt of the boat which was 35 degrees, which is indicating IT was very rough. His spirits were fairly high, he was tucking himself into a space where he wasn't thrown around so much, so he could get some rest.
"It was nighttime, so they had been told to go and get some rest. And the distress signal of course was alerted at about 1:30 in the morning. So a lot of them have had some rest before the distress signal went out.
"This was his first ocean adventure. He is experienced in the water, but this was his first sea adventure. He's very experienced in rivers and lakes."
