No trace was found till yesterday afternoon of the six missing crews of Bangladeshi cargo vessel MV Hope that tilted in the Andaman Sea near the coast ofThailand onThursday.

The six are Master Captain Rajib Chandra Karmaker, Second Engineer Md Nezam Uddin, Electrician Mohammed Sadim Ali, Seaman Mahammad Nasir Uddin, Oiler Md Ali Hossain and Chief Cook Nasir Uddin.

The two bodies recovered by Merchant Vessel Baux Lagoon and Thai coastguards on Friday afternoon were identified yesterday as MV Hope's Chief Officer Mohammed Mahabub Morshed, 46, and Chief Engineer Kazi Saifuddin, 52.

Thai Navy resumed the search around 8:00am yesterday and ended it around 4:00pm, Captain Mohiuddin Abdul Kadir, chief executive officer of the ship's insurance company Interport Maritime Ltd, told The Daily Star.

On July 2, MV Hope left Port Lumut of Malaysia for Chittagong Port with 17 crew members and 5,500 tonnes of ball clay. It met hostile weather early Thursday about 30 nautical miles offPhuket.

Out of fear, all the men on board had abandoned the ship. Six of them were rescued on Thursday and another three on Friday.

Abu Bakar Siddique, one of the crews rescued from the sea by a Thai Navy helicopter on Thursday and now undergoing treatment at a hospital in Phuket Island, recognised the uniforms on the two decomposed bodies, said Mohiuddin.

Thai Navy issued messages to vessels crossing the area to keep an eye out for the missing, he quoted Rescue Coordination Centre, Bangkok.

Like in the last two days, family members of the missing yesterday thronged the offices of the ship's owner firm Trade Breeze Shipping Ltd and Interport Maritime Ltd in Chittagong to enquire about their missing relatives.

Kabir Hossain, elder brother of Nasir Uddin, said he would wait in Chittagong for news of his brother rather than return home in the capital.