The ship, the Eastern Star, capsized late Monday in stormy weather as it ferried 458 passengers and crew along a stretch of the Yangtze that winds through central China`s Hubei province, authorities said.

By Tuesday afternoon, only 15 survivors and five bodies had been recovered, state media reported, amid a desperate effort to reach those trapped inside the wreck.

Divers plunged into the river, and rescue workers gathered along part of the vessel`s upturned hull that was sticking out of the water.

The divers knocked on the ship under the water and heard responses from inside, a state-run local newspaper reported. Welders were trying to cut the cabin open.

Captain, engineer in custody

One rescue worker was seen lying on the exposed part of the hull, tapping the metal with a small hammer and apparently listening out for responses.

The searchers continued to pull the occasional survivor from the submerged ship during the afternoon.

The captain and chief engineer, who both made it off the ship alive, have been taken into custody for questioning by police, according to state media.

The fates of the hundreds of other people aboard the ship remained unclear.

Youngest passenger was 3 years old

Their relatives were desperately seeking news.

Yan Mao told CNN that his mother, aunt, and two cousins were on the ship after boarding it at Nanjing, the eastern Chinese city where the multiday river cruise began Thursday.

Yan said he was on his way to Wuhan, a major city roughly 150 kilometers (95 miles) from the area where the ship is reported to have gone down.

"I am anxious to find them," he told CNN. "Of course I believe they are alive, otherwise I wouldn`t go there."

Yang Min, a resident of Shanghai whose parents and child were on the ship, said he was anxiously waiting with many other families for updates at a local government office in the city.

Most of the 406 passengers on the cruise were aged between 50 and 80, according to a list published by state media. The youngest was only 3 years old.

There were also 47 crew members and five travel agency workers on board, according to state media. All of those on board were reported to be Chinese citizens.

Alarm raised by survivor

The Eastern Star capsize around 9:30 p.m. Monday during a storm over the section of the river that flows through Hubei`s Jianli county, Xinhua reported, citing the Yangtze River navigation administration.

Xinhua said the captain and engineer both claimed the ship had been hit by a longjuanfeng, a Chinese word that can be translated as cyclone or tornado.

But Zhang Zuqiang, a senior official with the China Meteorological Administration, told the newspaper Beijing News that he wasn`t sure that there had been a longjuanfeng.

Zhang described the conditions at the time of the sinking as severe convective weather with severe precipitation. A team of weather experts have been dispatched to Hubei to investigate further, he said.

Local authorities launched their rescue efforts after receiving a phone call from a survivor who had managed to swim ashore, according to Chinese media.

The sunken ship is now located about 3 kilometers from the shore where the river is around 15 meters (50 feet) deep, China`s state-run broadcaster CCTV reported.

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