Storm sinks tall ship HMS Bounty, one missing

WASHINGTON (AFP) - A replica of the HMS Bounty that starred in Hollywood movies sank on Monday in towering waves whipped up by mega-storm Sandy; fourteen crew survived, but one was missing and one was found "unresponsive."

The US Coast Guard said it had found Ms Claudene Christian, 42, "unresponsive" late on Monday and she had been helicoptered to hospital amid a dramatic sea search for one man still missing in the Atlantic Ocean.

The crew abandoned the 55-metre three-mast ship, built in 1960 for the film "Mutiny on the Bounty" starring Marlon Brando, before it sank in the fierce seas, its owner said.

The ship was off the coast of North Carolina when it radioed in a distress call on Sunday night. Before dawn on Monday, with the ship lacking power and taking on water and the crew unable to pump fast enough, they abandoned ship and took to two life boats in cold water survival suits and life jackets, the US Coast Guard said. Coast Guard helicopters initially plucked 14 crew members out of the raging water. The woman was found later in the day, but a man believed to be the ship's captain named as Mr Robin Walbridge, 63, was still missing, the Coast Guard said.