A boat belonging to a sailor who has been missing for seven months has washed ashore in the Azores Islands.

The man – 44-year-old Joseph Johnson of North Carolina, USA – has not been found.

Carolina Beach police said Mr Johnson was last seen leaving the town’s Federal Point Yacht Club on 22 November last year on his boat.

He was reported missing five days later by a friend who arrived in town for a previously arranged fishing trip.

Despite a lengthy search lasting 53 hours and covering about 7,498 square miles, coast guard crews could not locate him.

But authorities in Sao Jorge Island, a small island in the Azores in the mid-Atlantic, contacted Carolina Beach police to say a 2006 fishing boat which washed ashore last week was found to be registered to Mr Johnson.

The Portuguese authorities are now helping Carolina Beach police in gathering evidence and information in a bid to try to find the missing man.

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