Dutch emergency services are searching for survivors after a cargo ship collided with a foot passenger ferry in a shipping canal.

The accident shut down shipping traffic on the canal as rescuers looked for ferry passengers who might have been thrown into the water.

The captain of the passenger boat was reported missing.

The accident took place near the town of Nieuwer ter Aa about 20 miles south of Amsterdam in the busy Amsterdam-Rhine Canal.

Foot passenger boats in the Netherlands are usually smaller than normal ferries.