Seven US Navy crew missing, commander hurt in crash off Japan

Yokosuka : The US and Japan were conducting a major search operation Saturday to find seven missing American sailors after their navy destroyer collided with a much larger container ship, crushing the side of the military vessel.

Planes, boats and helicopters scoured the seas off Japan's Pacific coast in a bid to find the crew who disappeared in the predawn accident, which also left the USS Fitzgerald's skipper injured.

It was not clear where the missing sailors were when the collision happened.

"Search and rescue efforts continue by US and Japanese aircraft and surface vessels in the hopes of recovering the seven USS Fitzgerald (crew) still unaccounted for," the navy said Saturday evening.

The names are being withheld until their families have been notified. 

Several other crew members were injured and had to be evacuated by air to hospital, including the guided missile destroyer's commanding officer Bryce Benson. 

Aerial television footage showed one person lying on a stretcher and a rescuer being pulled up to a helicopter that was hovering above the Fitzgerald, part of its right side caved in. 

The collision between the Fitzgerald and Philippine-flagged container ship ACX Crystal happened around 2:30 am (1730 GMT Friday) off the coast of the Izu peninsula, southwest of Tokyo.

The damaged ship later sailed back to its base in Yokosuka. The accident happened 56 nautical miles (104 kilometres) southwest of the area, the navy said.

The crash site is a busy shipping channel that is a gateway to major container ports in Yokohama and Tokyo.

"The volume of ships is heavy in this area and there have been accidents before," coastguard official Yutaka Saito told Japan's public broadcaster NHK.

NHK said the massive 222-metre (730 foot) container vessel made a sharp turn around the time of the crash with the smaller, 154-metre US warship, but its captain suggested otherwise.

"(We) were sailing in the same direction as the US destroyer was and then collided," he was quoted as saying by Jiji Press news agency.