Associated Press The container ship Ville D' Aquarius docked at Port Newark after an inspection revealed evidence of stowaways. 
 
 Federal authorities vowed to continue searching through the night Wednesday for stowaways believed to be hidden aboard a freight ship at the Port Newark Container Terminal, hours after Coast Guard officials first reported suspicious noises during a routine inspection. 
 
 A Coast Guard team boarded the Ville D'Aquarius cargo ship at 3 a.m. as it entered New York Harbor just below the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. Inspectors heard banging coming from inside a shipping container buried deep within the cargo stacks, which had been loaded in India nearly three weeks ago. 
 
 The sounds were "consistent with the possibility of people being inside," said Coast Guard spokesman Charles Rowe. 
 
 More than 15 hours later, no stowaways had been found despite a search of some 150 containers on the ship. Mr. Rowe dismissed published reports claiming that dead bodies had been discovered, calling them "completely erroneous." 
 
 Although there are 2,039 containers on board the ship, the initial search focused on a group of about 170 containers, officials said. A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security said they weren't giving up. 
 
 "Officials will continue to examine containers overnight," said U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman Anthony Bucci in a statement. 
 
 Still, there were signs that expectations of finding stowaways had waned over a long day. 
 
 In the morning, vehicles from hazardous-materials teams, state emergency-medical crews and local personnel from nearby towns had rushed to the site, ready to help people who might have spent desperate weeks trapped in a container. 
 
 Enlarge Image Close Associated Press Emergency officials arrived at Port Newark on Wednesday morning. 
 
 By evening, however, only a lone Port Authority police car and a single ambulance remained on standby. Three agencies, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, the Coast Guard and the Port Authority Police Department, continued the search. 
 
 Picking through the cargo is a slow and painstaking process, officials said, noting that the containers are about the size of a tractor-trailer truck. Each search takes about eight minutes, including lifting the container out of the ship by overhead crane and cutting it open. 
 
 The container suspected of carrying people was buried at the bottom of the pile when the ship arrived at Port Newark around 8:45 a.m. "It makes it harder," Mr. Rowe said. 
 
 Inspectors became suspicious during the search early Wednesday morning after they heard a tapping response to their own raps against the containers. 
 
 "We tapped twice, we heard two taps in response. We tapped three times, we heard three taps in response," Mr. Rowe said. "So that's an indication that there's humans inside." 
 
 Hours later he reported: "It's gone silent." 
 
 Enlarge Image Close Justin Lane/European Pressphoto Agency Ambulances stand by at the Port of Newark as the cargo ship Ville D'Aquarius is searched for suspected stowaways on Wednesday. 
 
 The docking in Newark marked the ship's first stop in U.S. during this voyage. The vessel's journey began in the United Arab Emirates on May 30, with stops in Pakistan, India and Egypt. The container ship is registered in Cyprus. 
 
 The container believed to be holding stowaways was loaded on June 7 in Mundra, India. It was labeled as holding manufacturing parts bound for Norfolk, Va., the ship's final U.S. stop, Mr. Rowe said. 
 
 The ship had most recently stopped in Egypt on June 15. 
 
 If stowaways are found on board and they don't claim asylum, federal authorities could send them back to their countries of origin, with the vessel owner paying expenses, officials said. A claim of asylum would send any stowaways to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for processing and a possible hearing. 
 
 —Danny Gold and Sean Gardiner contributed to this article. 

 Dock workers rushed to unload stacked containers from a cargo ship that arrived in New Jersey from the Middle East on Wednesday after a Coast Guard inspection team heard knocking for about two hours that suggested stowaways might be inside one of the boxes. 
 
 This image made from video provided by Eyewitness News WABC-TV shows an aerial view near a container ship in Newark with suspected stowaways. Dock workers rushed to unload containers stacked on top of... (Associated Press) 
 
 This image made from video provided by Eyewitness News WABC-TV shows an aerial view of a container ship in Newark with suspected stowaways. Dock workers rushed to unload containers stacked on top of one... (Associated Press) 
 
 This image made from video provided by Eyewitness News WABC-TV shows an aerial view of a container ship in Newark with suspected stowaways. Dock workers rushed to unload containers stacked on top of one... (Associated Press) 
 
 More than a dozen ambulances and law enforcement officials met the 850-foot Ville D'Aquarius when it docked early Wednesday at Port Newark, one of the nation's busiest ports. Large mechanical cranes began unloading containers from the ship. 
 
 By midday Wednesday, all but one ambulance had quietly left the pier. By evening, officials had inspected 150 of the 200 containers authorities believe could be carrying people and no stowaways had been found. The search was to continue on Thursday. The ship has 2,000 containers altogether. 
 
 The Coast Guard team had boarded the ship outside New York Harbor early Wednesday as the ship prepared to dock, spokesman Charles Rowe said. The officers were knocking on a bulkhead, or partition, of the ship as a routine security check and heard knocks back, he said, but they couldn't pinpoint the source of the sound. The return knocks ended after about two hours, Rowe said. 
 
 The team followed protocol and didn't open containers at sea in order to control the situation, he said. 
 
 Drew Barry, of the Sandy Hook Pilots Association, said he boarded the vessel about 20 miles offshore to help pilot it into port. 
 
 "There are at least 30 to 40 containers on top of the hatch cover, and I don't know how many more below it," Barry said. "If there are people down there, with no food and water for days, they're probably pretty desperate by now." 
 
 Shipping containers are steel boxes, usually 8 feet wide and 8- to 10-feet high and either 20- or 40-feet long, designed to withstand the rigors of the high seas and are strong enough to be stacked several high. 
 
 They normally can be opened only from the outside. There's hardly any ventilation. 
 
 Rowe said it was taking about eight minutes to check each container _ unloading it off the ship, opening it up and X-raying it if necessary. 
 
 The Department of Homeland Security, which was also involved in the investigation, said Wednesday night that its officers and agents were prepared to continue examining containers through the night. 
 
 The container ship, which a manifest said was carrying machine parts to Norfolk, Va., was loaded in India, Rowe said. 
 
 The ship began its voyage May 30 in the United Arab Emirates, then made one stop in Pakistan and two stops in India. Its last port before Newark was in Egypt on June 15. 
 
 Speaking at an unrelated news conference, Andrew McLees, special agent in charge of Homeland Security investigations for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said the ship's origin and itinerary prompted the initial search. 
 
 "The routing of the ship and the ports of call was what led to the actions," McLees said. 
 
 Michael Ward, the FBI's top official in New Jersey, said the response was appropriate given the port's vulnerability. The area is considered a prime potential target for terrorists. 
 
 "You're going to get a response like this any time you have these types of facts," Ward said. "It was an appropriate response which we did out of an abundance of caution." 
 
 Shipping companies are legally responsible for keeping stowaways off their vessels, said Frank Atcheson, a maritime lawyer based in North Bergen, N.J. When stowaways are found, the companies are liable not only for fines but also must pay to house the stowaways where they are found and for secure transportation back to where they originated. 
 
 Between January 1998 and Dec. 16, 2011, more than 13,000 stowaways were found in more than 4,000 incidents around the world, according to the International Maritime Organization. 
 
 Some of the higher-profile discoveries of recent years: 22 Chinese men, all in good health, arrived in Seattle in 2006; 32 Chinese men, also in good health, were found in Los Angeles in 2005; eight people, most of them Turkish, were found dead along with five survivors in a ship in Ireland in 2001. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Associated Press writers Geoff Mulvihill in Haddonfield, N.J., and David Porter in Newark, N.J., contributed to this report.
– Frantic federal authorities were continuing to search containers on a massive cargo ship last night for stowaways after Coast Guard officials reported hearing suspicious noises during a routine inspection at the Newark port. Inspectors heard knocking from inside a shipping container buried deep within the cargo stacks, which had been loaded in India nearly three weeks ago. The sounds were "consistent with the possibility of people being inside," a Coast Guard spokesman told the Wall Street Journal. No one was found after a search of 150 containers on the ship, but the vessel is carrying 2,039 containers. "Officials will continue to examine containers overnight," said a Customs and Border Protection spokesman. But several emergency vehicles left as the search was continuing, indicating officials were less optimistic someone would be found. A Coast Guard official said inspectors knocked on containers and received the same number of taps in return—but they couldn't tell where the taps were coming from. Two hours later the sounds fell silent, notes AP. The ship started out in the United Arab Emirates, with stops in Pakistan, India—where it was loaded—and Egypt. Newark is the ship's first stop in the US. Shipping containers are steel boxes, usually eight feet wide, eight feet high, and 20 or 40 feet long.