The search was aborted yesterday for a missing sailor who abandoned ship roughly 750 miles east of here.

Harbour Radio said it received a call on Thursday afternoon that a 54-year-old crewman aboard the merchant vessel Ivory Nina had jumped overboard.

By Thursday night it appeared as though the man had drowned. That night the US Coast Guard flew out from Port Elisabeth, New Jersey and searched until midnight with a C-130 aircraft. The plane and crew returned to the Island Thursday night. Yesterday morning they decided to abandon the search.

The name and nationality of the missing sailor has not been disclosed.