Search for 14-year-old Florida boaters enters sixth day

By Barbara Liston

ORLANDO, Fla. (Reuters) - The search for two 14-year-old boys from Florida who went missing while on a fishing trip in the Atlantic Ocean entered a sixth day on Wednesday, with the U.S. Coast Guard saying there was still a chance they may survive their ordeal.

Their 19-foot, single-engine boat was found overturned on Sunday east of Ponce Inlet near Daytona Beach, 180 miles north of Jupiter, Florida, where Austin Stephanos and Perry Cohen were last spotted on Friday buying fuel.

Authorities are looking for the boys as far north as Charleston, South Carolina, in an area that extends 100 miles offshore, having expanded the search zone on the basis of Atlantic Ocean currents. Charleston is more than 500 miles north of where Austin Stephanos and Perry Cohen launched their boat in Jupiter on Friday.

"The chance of survival is still there," U.S. Coast Guard Petty Officer Jon-Paul Rios said on Tuesday night.

As of Wednesday, there was no plan to end the search, Petty Officer Anthony Soto said.

The Coast Guard has calculated that it is possible searchers will find the boys alive based on such factors as water temperature, passage of time, and their age and health, Rios said.

Stephanos and Cohen were fishing buddies and neighbors in Palm Beach County.

(Editing by Frank McGurty and Will Dunham)