Police spokesman Oliver Soko said a massive joint police and Malawi Lake Services rescue operation is underway around Chipoka Harbour where the overloaded boat capsized.
The owner of one of Kahn's more eccentric ventures, a concrete boat designed as a music barge in the 1960s and still in operation, was stunned to be visited by the child he had met so long ago, and dissolved into a tearful embrace.
In August 1928, during the original rescue operation for Amundsen and the French crew, the left wing pontoon of the Latham 47 flying boat was recovered from the sea.