SAN PEDRO, CA — The Coast Guard suspended its search and rescue efforts Tuesday for survivors after a scuba diving boat caught fire and sank Monday morning near Santa Cruz Island off the Southern California coast. It is presumed 34 people perished in the boat fire.

Thirty-nine passengers and crew members departed Santa Barbara Harbor on Saturday aboard the boat called Conception for a Labor Day weekend trip.

During a press conference Tuesday morning, Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown said 20 bodies had been recovered. Several other bodies were found but not yet retrieved.

Of the recovered bodies, 11 were females and nine were males. The process of identifying victims and notifying families was underway, Brown said.

He said no other survivors were found.

The U.S. Coast Guard suspended its search for survivors as of 9:40 a.m. Tuesday, according to Coast Guard Capt. Monica Rochester. In total, Coast Guard assets searched for 23 hours covering approximately 160 square miles.

“It is never an easy decision to suspend search efforts,” she said. “Our hearts and thoughts are with the friends and families of the victims.”

Five crew members jumped off the burning ship and evacuated aboard a good Samaritan pleasure craft named Grape Escape, Rochester said. One crew member suffered non life-threatening injuries.

The Coast Guard’s Los Angeles/Long Beach station received a mayday call around 3:15 a.m. Monday of the engulfed 75-foot commercial diving boat off the north shore of Santa Cruz Island near Platt’s Harbor in Santa Barbara County.

Crews from the Coast Guard, Santa Barbara Fire and Ventura County Fire fought the flames, but around 7:20 a.m. the boat sank 20 yards offshore in 64 feet of water, according to the Coast Guard.

Divers with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department assisted in the search. Personnel from the Long Beach Police Department helped establish a security perimeter.

Rochester said the crew probably was able to escape because they were awake and above deck when the fire broke out.

The cause of the fire was under investigation, and personnel from the National Transportation Safety Board were involved in the probe of the deadly incident.

The Conception was owned by Truth Aquatics, a Santa Barbara-based company founded in 1974.

Built in 1981 in Long Beach, the Conception was docked in Santa Barbara. The boat had a maximum capacity of 46 people, with 13 double bunks and 20 single bunks, according to the website California Diving News.

Brown said the Conception took off Saturday morning and was scheduled to return Tuesday morning.

A shrine of candles and flowers appeared on the Santa Barbara dock where the Conception was scheduled to dock.

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Family members looking for information about their loved ones were advised to call 833-688-5551 or 800-400-1572. A Family Assistance Center was set up at Earl Warren Fair Grounds, 3400 Calle Real, Santa Barbara.

Brown said investigators would be working to compare DNA samples from the bodies with samples from relatives of the victims. He said investigators would compare the identities with a list of 34 names of people believed to have died aboard the boat to make sure they actually were aboard the vessel when it sank.

No identifications have been released.

California Sen. Dianne Feinstein called for an investigation into the deaths.

“It’s inconceivable that with all the safety regulations we have in place today, a fire on a boat can lead to the loss of life we saw this morning near Santa Cruz Island,” she said on Monday.

“We need an immediate and robust interagency investigation. The Coast Guard, along with officials from Santa Barbara and Ventura counties, are already hard at work. Once personnel from the NTSB and FBI join the effort tomorrow, we must learn as much as possible about how this happened and how future tragedies can be prevented.”

Brown said Tuesday that investigators had received statements written by the surviving crew members, but had not yet interviewed them.

Brown noted that recordings that had been released of mayday calls may have “conflated” – or combined – calls made by a crew member of the Conception with calls made by one or more good Samaritan vessels.

Brown also said radio calls regarding “explosions” apparently were made well after the fire began, and that there were no indications that explosions had preceded the fire.

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City News Service contributed to this report.