BALTIMORE (AP) – Rescue crews searched the Chesapeake Bay on Sunday for a prominent publisher and former diplomat whose sailboat was found empty and drifting in shallow water.

Philip Merrill, 72, an experienced sailor, had taken his 41-foot sailboat out alone Saturday, and he typically followed an 18-mile round trip without wearing a lifejacket, said Col. Mark S. Chaney, superintendent of the Maryland Natural Resources Police.

Skies were clear with winds gusting up to 25 mph – “a condition that would probably be difficult for a single sailor alone,” Chaney said.

State and federal agencies searched 100 square miles of the bay with aircraft and boats. But rescue crews think Merrill fell overboard since his wallet was found on board and there was no damage to the boat, officials said.

“As time goes by, chances of survival are less and less,” Chaney said.

Merrill’s family issued a statement saying he had been an avid yachtsman since he first learned to sail at age 7.

“If there was anyone who could captain a boat competently alone, it was Phil,” the statement said. “He just couldn’t resist a sunny day with the wind at his back.”

Two boaters found Merrill’s boat near Plum Point, about 25 miles south of Annapolis, and called police, officials said

Merrill is chairman of the board of Annapolis-based Capital-Gazette Communications Inc., which publishes Washingtonian magazine, The Capital and five other Maryland newspapers.

Merrill took leave from publishing in December 2002 to be president and chairman of the Export-Import Bank of the United States. His term expired in July 2005.

He served as assistant secretary-general of NATO in Brussels from 1990 to 1992 and from 1983 to 1990 he served on the Department of Defense Policy Board. From 1981 to 1983, he was counselor to the undersecretary of defense for policy. In 1988, the secretary of defense awarded him the Medal for Distinguished Service, the highest civilian honor given by the department.

Merrill has represented the United States in negotiations on the Law of the Sea Conference, the International Telecommunications Union and various disarmament and exchange agreements with the former Soviet Union. He is a former special assistant to the deputy secretary of state and has worked in the White House on national security affairs.

The college of journalism at the University of Maryland was named for him, as was the headquarters of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation – both after multimillion-dollar donations.