Oranjestad, Aruba ? About 700 volunteers joined police, soldiers and FBI agents on Monday, combing scrubland and beaches on Aruba’s southeastern tip in an unprecedented search for an Alabama teenager who vanished a week ago on a trip to the Dutch Caribbean island.

Aruba’s government let 4,000 civil servants off work early at 2 p.m. to hunt for Natalee Holloway, 18, of Mountain Brook, Ala. The expanded search began a day after police charged two men in her disappearance.

The honors student vanished May 30 while on a five-day trip with more than 100 classmates celebrating their high school graduation. Seven chaperones accompanied them.

Kenneth Angela and three co-workers from Aruba’s lottery company were among the hundreds who boarded 10 buses in the community of Santa Cruz, about six miles from the capital, Oranjestad, to be taken to the search site.

“It’s the first time Aruba has done such a big search,” said Angela, a 31-year-old lottery supervisor. “We want to keep Aruba’s name good. That’s why we’re here, to help find Natalee.”

The initial idea for the search called for an islandwide effort, but later changed focus to the southeastern area of Seroe Colorado and part of San Nicolas, police commander Judy Hassell said. San Nicolas is where authorities arrested the two men who were charged in the case.

Civilians search in coordination with Dutch marines on Monday for Natalee Holloway, 18, an Alabama high school graduate who disappeared while she was on a five-day graduation trip to Aruba. Monday's search was along the southeastern shore of Aruba in Seroe Colorado.

Hassell said Aruba’s 74 square miles, slightly larger than Washington, D.C., made a full search of the island impractical. “We’re going to do as much as we can,” he said.

Hassell said she asked the Justice Ministry for permission to conduct another big search today but had not yet received permission.

The coast guard said Aruba’s shoreline already had been searched on foot, by boat and helicopter, but the new search was more thorough.

Holloway’s disappearance has shaken the sense of security many of Aruba’s 97,000 people took for granted. Only one murder and six rapes were recorded last year. So far this year, there have been two murders and three rapes on the island, where the average annual income is a comfortable $22,000.

The two suspects, aged 28 and 30, were arrested in a raid before dawn Sunday. Police said the men work as security guards. Neighbors said the pair served as guards at a hotel under renovation near the one where Holloway stayed.

Aruba officials declined to provide specific charges, saying the case will go before a judge by today to determine whether the men can be legally held. Authorities had not found any of Holloway’s belongings at the suspects’ homes.