SEOUL, April 18 -- A vice principal of South Korea's Danwon High School, of which hundreds of students were still missing in a ferry disaster, was found dead Friday afternoon, local media reported.

The 52-year-old deputy principal surnamed Kang was found hanging himself from a tree on a hill near an indoor gym on Jindo Island, where parents of the missing students were staying, at around 4:05 p.m., police said.

The senior teacher, who was known to have accused himself of his survival when hundreds of students remained unaccounted for, disappeared from Thursday night, said the police who searched for him for some 15 hours.

No last will of him was found at the scene, but he was suspected to have killed himself out of a sense of guilt.

Kang was rescued by a helicopter Wednesday when the 6,825-ton passenger ship, "Sewol," capsized and sank off Jindo Island near the southwestern tip of South Korea.

Among the 475 passengers aboard the sunken vessel were 325 high school students and 15 teachers on their way for a four-day field trip. The ship departed from South Korea's western port city of Incheon Tuesday night for the southern resort island of Jeju.

A total of 75 students from the high school in Ansan, a Seoul suburb, were rescued Wednesday, but 11 students have been confirmed dead, with 239 others still missing.