Mike Lynch, the UK tech entrepreneur whose wife owns the sunken superyacht Bayesian, is among those feared dead after the vessel sank off the coast of Sicily on Monday.
Divers have recovered the bodies of four out of six missing passengers from the wreckage, though the Italian Coast Guard has not yet formally identified them.
According to BBC reports, the search has focused on Lynch, his daughter Hannah, Jonathan Bloomer, chairman of Morgan Stanley Bank International, his wife Judy Bloomer and others on board.
The first two bodies were brought ashore to Porticello harbour on Wednesday afternoon. Later that evening, two more bodies were recovered before the search was paused as night fell.
The Bayesian sank early Monday morning, approximately 700 meters off the coast, during freak weather conditions. The yacht is believed to have been struck by a waterspout, causing it to capsize and sink 50 meters (164 feet) to the seabed.
Throughout Wednesday, a steady stream of boats ferried divers to and from the search site, with dozens of emergency services personnel lining the small quayside as the bodies were returned by boat. One body bag was seen being placed into an ambulance, which then left the port under police escort, its sirens filling the harbour.
The Italian authorities have not yet identified the recovered bodies, despite media reports suggesting some names. This delay is likely because they are waiting to recover all six bodies before notifying the victims’ families.
According to Italian law, the deceased must be formally identified by a family member or a close associate before their death can be officially certified.
Investigations
Meanwhile, the head of Sicily’s civil protection agency, Salvo Cocina, stated that while there would be an investigation in due course, the immediate priority is to recover everyone who was on board the Bayesian. So far, four bodies have been brought ashore, with rescuers having located a fifth, which has yet to be recovered. One person remains missing.
Four bodies have been brought ashore. Salvo Cocina, the director of Sicily’s civil protection agency, said rescuers had found another body but were yet to recover it. One person remains missing.
Cocina told The Telegraph that he believed Lynch and his daughter had been found.
He added, “On behalf of myself and my colleagues, I would like to express my deepest sympathy to the families of the victims and express our condolences to them at this difficult time.”
22 persons on board
Neda Morvillo, an American jewellery designer, and her husband, Chris, are also among the missing.
The Bayesian, which was 56m long and flying a British flag, was carrying 10 crew and 12 passengers when it sank.
Of the 22 people on board, 15 survived – including a British mother who described holding her baby girl above the surface of the sea to save her from drowning.
The body of the yacht’s chef, Canadian-Antiguan national, Recaldo Thomas, was found on Monday.
Gareth Williams, a friend of Thomas, told the BBC he had known the chef for 30 years as they had grown up together in Antigua, where Thomas lived during yachting’s off-season.
The passengers aboard were guests of Mr Lynch – founder of the software giant Autonomy – and were reportedly there to celebrate his acquittal in a massive US fraud case.
Lynch was acquitted in June of multiple fraud charges relating to Autonomy’s $11bn (£8.6bn) sale to the US computing giant Hewlett-Packard in 2011.
Investigations
Inspections of the yacht’s internal hull also took place on Wednesday morning. At the same time, a team of four British inspectors from the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) arrived in Sicily on Wednesday at the site.
The depth of the shipwreck has proved challenging for the rescue effort.
Italian rescue services said the team of specialist divers had been hampered by the fact the Bayesian is lying on its side at the bottom of the seabed, with its access points choked with debris.
Speaking before the bodies were recovered, professional diver Andy Goddard said conditions would be “pretty dark” on the wreck with very limited ambient light at that depth.
“You’re in this space and you’ve got stuff floating all around you, like being in a washing machine. It’s really dangerous for the diver,” he told BBC Radio 5 Live.
Search resumes Thursday
Searches resumed Thursday for the last person missing after a superyacht carrying UK tech tycoon Mike Lynch sank off Sicily, with divers recovering a fifth body from the wreck.
Specialist divers working with an underwater robot on Wednesday pulled up four bodies from the wreck of the “Bayesian,” while another was pulled up on Thursday morning, according to AFP reporters.
AFP reports that fifteen people were rescued, including Lynch’s wife and a woman with a one-year-old baby.
