“We just approached the hull of the ship, we got near and then banged, knocked, in order for us to give a sign if ever there are still people inside,” Lt. Col. Edgard Arevalo of the coast guard said. “Unfortunately there was no response.”  A United States Navy ship from Okinawa, Japan, was expected to arrive early Tuesday near Sibuyan Island, south of Manila, where the ferry sank, said Jesus Dureza, press secretary to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Helicopters on the ship could help survey the area for possible survivors.  Elsewhere, officials tried to assess the losses from the typhoon. Iloilo, a central province, was the worst hit, with deaths approaching 100, officials said on Monday. There was concern, too, for the welfare of nearly 70,000 people across the country who are living in evacuation centers.  Mrs. Arroyo ordered tighter maritime regulations, telling her advisers in a video conference that “no vessel sails if it would pass a possible typhoon path.” She is on a state visit in the United States.  Coast Guard officials said they had cleared the ferry to leave Manila for Cebu, a city in the central Philippines, on Friday night because the initial forecast for the typhoon showed it would hit only the eastern part of the country. But the government’s weather bureau said the typhoon changed direction on Saturday, moving toward the center of the country and running right into the ferry’s path.  A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A14 of the New York edition with the headline: Hopes for Survivors Fading At Sunken Philippine Ferry. Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe
The known dead from the ferry brought the death toll from the typhoon, named Fengshen, to more than 180, the Philippine National Red Cross said.