By ROHAN SULLIVAN,
Associated Press

SYDNEY – Planes and ships searching a remote patch of the Indian Ocean found no signs Tuesday of additional survivors from the sinking of a suspected asylum-seeker boat. Eleven people were believed missing, while 27 were rescued.

Merchant ships that responded to distress calls from the stricken vessel plucked dozens from the sea on Monday, a day after it went down. Some of the survivors swam to a life raft dropped by an Australian military plane, officials said. One person taken aboard a rescue vessel died.

Australian Home Affairs Minister Brendan O’Connor said a Japanese fishing vessel would join the search Tuesday. The merchant ship LNG Pioneer remained in the area and seven Australian aircraft were also searching the waters. A Taiwanese fishing trawler that had helped rescue survivors was leaving to refuel, he said.

"We’ll do everything we can ... to recover people that are in the water but of course there are grave concerns for the safety of these 11 people," O’Connor said.

The nationalities of the people on the sunken boat was not known and Australian officials have refused to speculate on whether they were asylum seekers trying to reach Australia. But aspects of the emergency — such as an unseaworthy boat carrying so many people in waters sometimes used by human traffickers — signaled that may be the case.