English coastguards on Thursday renewed their hunt for a missing Dutch fishing boat with four people on board. Two boats with sonar to search the sea bed will join in the search which started again at daybreak.

The trawler is thought to have run into trouble on Wednesday afternoon but did not issue any alarm signals or warnings.

It vanished from English radar close to the English coast at 14.45 hours.

Two of the crew came from Urk in the Netherlands. The other two came from Belgium and Portugal, local broadcaster Omroep Flevoland said.

‘There is always hope but in this case not much,’ Dutch coastguard Peter Westenberg is quoted as saying by broadcaster Nos.