Chinese junk carrying a Canadian and two Europeans.

US Coast Guard and Navy airplanes, some flying out of Bermuda, have been involved in the search since Tuesday night when an SOS flare was spotted 1,000 miles east southeast of the Island.

The junk, called the Wu Wei , has been missing for two weeks.

She was sailing from Charleston, South Carolina to the Canadian Magdelen Islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where she was due on July 29. The wife of skipper Gabriel Pinchaud, 37, who lives on the islands, alerted the Coast Guard when the vessel failed to show.

US Coast Guard units from South Carolina to Maine have been searching for the 29-foot junk since then.

On Tuesday, a merchant vessel passing east southeast of the Island spotted a red SOS flare. The source of the flare is unknown, but it prompted authorities to think it may have been from the junk.

The singled masted, junk-rigged sailing vessel has a dark green hull, grey deck, reddish brown sails and a white stay sail.

Also on board are Sonja Schuster, a 20-year-old Austrian, and Heiko Schmid, a 27-year-old German.

All ports and harbours along the US and Canadian coast have been investigated.

The search has turned up look-alike junks but no Wu Wei .

A spokesman for the US Coast Guard said the whole US east coast will continue to be searched until something is found or the search is called off.

Tuesday's search saw a US Navy P-3 Orion searching the waters to the east southeast of the Island. Yesterday, the search was taken over by a Coast Guard plane using the Island as its base.

The mystery of the boat's whereabouts is compounded by the flare's location which was completely off Wu Wei's intended route.

Although the Wu Wei was travelling in a northerly direction towards Nova Scotia, a Canadian Coast Guard spokesman has said it was possible the vessel ended up off Bermuda.

Air flow was coming from the northeast during the junk's voyage and could have blown it back.

One US Coast Guard spokesman said if the boat was off the east southeast coast of Bermuda, it would have been found by now.

Spokesmen contacted yesterday consider the situation urgent, given there has been no sign of the boat in two weeks Bermuda's Harbour Radio has radioed all commercial ships and yachts passing through the area to keep a look out for Wu Wei .