TERMINI IMERESE, ITALY:

An Italian prosecutor has opened a manslaughter investigation into the deaths of British tech magnate Mike Lynch and six other people who were killed when a luxury yacht sank off Sicily this week.

The public prosecutor’s office of Termini Imerese, headed by Ambrogio Cartosio, announced the investigation, saying the probe was not aimed at any individual person.

Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter, Hannah, was also among those who died when the family’s 56-metre-long (184-foot) boat, the Bayesian, capsized during a fierce, pre-dawn storm on Monday off Porticello, near Palermo.

Fifteen people survived, including Lynch’s wife, whose company owned the Bayesian, and the yacht’s captain.

The captain, James Cutfield, and the other survivors have been questioned by the coast guard on behalf of prosecutors. None of them have commented publicly on how the ship went down.

Hannah Lynch’s body was discovered on Friday by divers who scoured the submerged vessel for the past five days. The five other dead passengers were recovered on Wednesday and Thursday, while the body of the only crew member who died, onboard chef Recaldo Thomas, was found on Monday.

The sinking has puzzled naval marine experts who say a boat like the Bayesian, built by Italian high-end yacht manufacturer Perini, should have withstood the storm and in any case should not have sunk as quickly as it did.

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Rescuers of the Vigili del Fuoco, the Italian Corps. of Firefighters patrol on a small boat in Porticello near Palermo, on August 21, 2024 two days after the British-flagged luxury yacht Bayesian sank. Rescuers with divers and an underwater drone search for six people believed trapped when the boat sank.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Divers resumed a search on Wednesday (August 21) for survivors after British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch’s yacht sank off the coast of Sicily two days ago, though hopes dwindled of finding the six missing people alive.

The British-flagged Bayesian, a 56-metre-long (184-ft) superyacht, was carrying 22 people and was anchored off the port of Porticello, near Palermo, when it capsized during a fierce storm on Monday.

Fifteen people survived, one crew member’s body was recovered and six passengers remain unaccounted for, including Lynch, his 18-year-old daughter and Jonathan Bloomer, a non-executive chair of Morgan Stanley International.

Underwater inspection of the wreck resumed early on Wednesday after being paused late on Tuesday, the fire department said on social media. It earlier described the operations as “long and complex”.

The yacht was lying sideways at a depth of around 50 metres, giving divers 8-10 minutes to inspect it before having to resurface. Efforts have been hampered by “very confined” spaces inside the wreck, fire department spokesman Luca Cari said.

MISSING PASSENGERS

Mr. Lynch, 59, is one of the UK’s best-known tech entrepreneurs. He built the country’s largest software firm, Autonomy, and was referred to as Britain’s Bill Gates.

He sold the firm to HP for $11 billion in 2011, after which the deal spectacularly unravelled with the U.S. tech giant accusing him of fraud, resulting in a lengthy trial. Mr. Lynch was acquitted on all charges by a jury in San Francisco in June.

The other missing passengers are Bloomer’s wife Judy, Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo and his wife, Neda Morvillo. Mr. Morvillo represented Mr. Lynch in the San Francisco trial, while Mr. Bloomer was a character witness on his behalf.

Experts have been at a loss to explain how a large luxury vessel, presumed to have top-class fittings and safety features, could have sunk within minutes, as recounted by witnesses. Another yacht anchored next to it was unharmed by the tempest.

Matthew Schanck, chair of the Maritime Search and Rescue Council, a U.K.-based non-profit organisation that trains sea rescuers, said the Bayesian was the victim of a “high impact” and rare weather event.

“If it was a water spout, which it appears to be, it’s what I would class as like a black swan event,” he told Reuters.

He said he was confident the authorities would “get to the bottom” of what caused the shipwreck, thanks to the accounts of survivors, witnesses and examination of the ship, which appears to have remained intact on the seabed.