Montreal police and firefighters have resumed the search for a boater presumed missing after a collision in the Port of Montreal late Tuesday night.

Police say a pleasure boat, believed to be between five and seven meters long, smashed into the MSC Diego, a docked container ship, at high speed just before 10 p.m. A crane operator on the ship told police he saw the boat headed straight towards his ship just before the impact.

"The whole front end was found floating around and it sank quickly after that," said Fire Department spokesperson John Primiani.

Fisherman Jacques Morin said he saw a boat matching the vessel's description passing by at a fast speed earlier in the day.

"It was a speedboat passing through here. It passes often, very fast," he said.

It isn't known how many people were aboard the smaller vessel, but witnesses told police they saw at least one person on the boat before it sank.

The Canadian Coast Guard and a provincial police helicopter were assisting the search, as well as a Hercules military plane based out of Trenton, Ont. On Thursday, the SQ deployed divers equipped with specialized sonar equipment.

Small pieces of the boat, along with a life vest, were found shortly before the search was called off due to darkness at about 1 a.m. 

Montreal Fire Deparment spokesperson John Primiani said police have been looking for abandoned cars at docks along the river. There have been no missing person reports filed that could be linked to the collision and that very little of the boat was left.

"There was a lot of debris that was picked up at the side," said Primiani. "The search is going up to Cap-St-Michel. With the water current, they can calculate they could float up to Cap-St-Michel."

- With Files from CTV Montreal