SAN FRANCISCO: Authorities will stop actively searching for missing US adventurer Steve Fossett, but will keep air crews on standby to fly to possible crash sites, a spokesman for Nevada’s public safety department said on Wednesday.

Chuck Allen of the Nevada Department of Public Safety said authorities continue to consider the hunt for Fossett a “search and rescue” mission, and that they are hopeful he is alive, but that the hunt would be scaled back.

In the most extensive search ever mounted in the western US state of Nevada, air crews have found no sign of Fossett, the first person to pilot a balloon solo around the world in 2002. Fossett took off alone in a single-engine air plane on Sept 3 from a private air strip in Nevada.

“Nobody is giving up on this man,” Allen said, but he added that authorities would announce later the number and type of aircraft that would be held in reserve to continue the search for Fossett.

“The search is going to continue. It’s just going to be scaled back,” he said.Search crews have scoured 98 per cent of Nevada during more than 1,300 hours of flight time seeking clues to what happened to Fossett.—Reuters