Missing Argentine submarine latest news: First pictures emerge of crew members feared dead in 'explosion'

The first pictures have emerged of crew members feared dead after an explosion was detected near to where the Argentine submarine disappeared.

The ARA San Juan and its crew of 44 have been missing since last Wednesday after vanishing about 300 miles from Argentina's southern coast.

Argentina's first woman submarine officer, a naval officer due to be married next month and an experienced commander are among those who were on board.

As hopes of finding the missing submarine plummeted on Thursday after Argentina's navy announced a sound thought to be an explosion were detected, the first images of those missing began to emerge.

Lieutenant Eliana Maria Krawczyk, 35, Argentina's first female submarine officer, is among those missing, according to Reuters.

Nicknamed "Queen of the Sea", she joined the navy in 2004 and rose to become master-at-arms.

She grew up in Misiones province, near the borders with Paraguay and Brazil, around 1,000 kilometres from sea.

Lieutenant Renzo Martin Silva, 32, who joined the navy when he was 18, is also feared dead, Straits Times reported. He grew up in the foothills of the Andes in the Argentine province of San Juan.

He reportedly planned to marry his girlfriend, a soldier, in 2018.

Father Fernando Santilli, 35, who became a submariner seven years ago, was also on board, Straits Times reported.

His wife, Jessica Gopar, shared her distress on Facebook on Tuesday.

She wrote: "Every day is harder. There are moments of hope, others of great distress. You cannot imagine how many people are praying for you."

She added: Mr... Commander, I beg you, I implore you to do the impossible because you go to surface. There are 44 lives in your hands, you decide."

The commander of the San Juan is also missing. Captain Pedro Martin Fernandez, 45, has been commander since 2015. He is married with three teenage children, according to Straits Times.

He has reportedly travelled the world in two decades of missions, living for 10 years in Mar del Plata, home port of the navy's two operational submarines.

Navy spokesman Enrique Balbi said the search will continue until there is full certainty about the fate of the ARA San Juan, despite the evidence of an explosion and with more than a week having passed since the submarine disappeared.

It was originally scheduled to arrive Monday at Argentina's Mar del Plata Navy Base.

The US Navy and an international nuclear test-ban monitoring organization said a "hydro-acoustic anomaly" was produced just hours after the navy lost contact with the sub on November 15.

It was near the submarine's last known location.

"According to this report, there was an explosion," Balbi told reporters. "We don't know what caused an explosion of these characteristics at this site on this date."

The navy spokesman described the "anomaly" as "singular, short, violent and non-nuclear."

Relatives of the crew who had gathered at the Mar del Plata base broke into tears and hugged each other after they received the news.

More than a dozen airplanes and ships have been participating in the multinational search.

"They haven't come back and they will never come back," said Ms Gopar. "I had a bad feeling about this and now it has been confirmed."