The rescue operation to find the crew of the sunken New Nuts went as well as it could have and the decision to call it off was correct, Bermuda Harbour Radio said yesterday.

But Marine and Ports will hold a review of the operation, which was aborted on Wednesday night when Harbour Radio, (formally known as the Rescue Co-ordination Centre Bermuda/Bermuda Harbour Radio) and the US Coast Guard service decided there was no chance of finding missing crewmen Alan Edness and Micah Battersbee.

Survivor Robert Lambe, 35, has told rescuers he did not see either of his two friends after a freak wave capsized their 41-foot boat on Tuesday evening. C-130 Coast Guard planes from Elizabeth City, North Carolina, searched the debris area where the New Nuts sank around 80 miles north-east of Bermuda from early on Wednesday, but found no sign of the missing fishermen.

Scott Simmons of Harbour Radio told The Royal Gazette yesterday: "Based on the information Mr. Lambe provided yesterday, which we got third hand, and what he has told us directly today, we remain comfortable with the decision-making process undertaken.

"The issues of the aircraft searching and finding the debris, of finding him, of survival time given the temperature of the water and the time that had elapsed, and based on his own observations that he was able to stay on top of the boat and never saw anyone else, all these factors point to the search being concluded at the appropriate time.

"You try to second guess everything and ensure you have covered everything, and the weather was an overwhelming factor in the search being concluded when it was. I am sure there will be a wider investigation."

There was, however, a short mix-up between Harbour Radio and the Coast Guard Co-Ordination Centre in Norfolk, Virginia, around midnight on Tuesday which resulted in a delay in the C-130 search plane being sent out.

At just after midnight on Tuesday, Harbour Radio requested the plane be sent out, but it was not despatched from Elizabeth City until almost three hours later.

A Coast Guard spokeswoman told The Royal Gazette that Harbour Radio originally asked for a delay in the plane being sent out because it wanted the search to begin at first light on Wednesday as Harbour Radio feared if the crew were sent out immediately they would need to return home after searching for just a few hours in the light.

When a decision was taken to launch the flight, there was a further one-and-a-half hour hitch because of mechanical problems. The Coast Guard spokeswoman said: "The reason for the delay in the launch was that originally Harbour Radio requested a first light search, which means not searching until the sun comes up.

"We called them back and said `can we launch now' and they were under the impression that if we launched early, our crews would have to come back (early) and launch again, and when we came back, they said go ahead and launch. Then we had mechanical problems that delayed launch for about an hour and a half."

But given there was no sign of the two missing fisherman after the New Nuts sank at around 6.30 p.m. on Tuesday, the delay is likely to have been irrelevant.

Mr. Simmons of Harbour Radio said he was not aware of why there had been a hold-up in despatching the C-130.

"Following our request, the Coast Guard would have made an assessment about what there was available," he said. "They always have crews available but there are always other things going on. We defer to them on questions of launching, but typically, they don't leave us hanging around, that's for sure. The aircraft was provided as fast as they could have provided it."

Under Marine and Ports regulations, the Minister of Transport has discretion to review rescue operations, and this will happen. A Government spokeswoman said Mr. Lambe would be debriefed when he is eventually dropped off by the US Naval hospital ship Comfort, which is on its way to the Persian Gulf, and returned to Bermuda.

Transport Minister Dr. Ewart Brown said yesterday: "For every exercise where we do things out of the norm, we review it for efficiency and effectiveness. The rescue seemed to go well.

"However, now is a time of mourning and the emphasis must be on the comfort and peace of the relatives of those lost."