The hunt for the one person who is still missing will recommence, following the tragic sinking of a private yacht named Bayesian during a tempest near the Sicilian shoreline, where five corpses were discovered inside its wreckage. The people on-board included six individuals, among them tech mogul Mike Lynch, who were reported missing since the yacht submerged around 5AM on a Monday morning.
Mr. Lynch traces his origins back to Ireland – his father having been a firefighter from County Cork and his mother, a nurse from County Tipperary. Salvatore Cocina, the chief of the Civil Protection Agency in Sicily, has confirmed that of the five corpses found on Wednesday, only four have been brought back to land. The exact location of the sixth missing person is yet to be ascertained.
The identities of the four bodies that were recovered have not been officially announced by the authorities, despite initial identification reports by local and global press. Body bags were seen being transported to the Porticello port on Wednesday afternoon. Mr. Cocina mentioned that the process of retrieving the fifth body is underway.
Among the listed missing persons are Hannah, Mr. Lynch’s eighteen-year-old daughter; Jonathan Bloomer, Chairman of Morgan Stanley International bank; his wife, Judy Bloomer; Chris Morvillo, an attorney at Clifford Chance; and his wife, Neda Morvillo.
Recaldo Thomas, a chef on the superyacht and a national of Canada and Antigua, was the first body to be retrieved from the sinking site on Monday. Out of the 22 crew members and voyagers, 15 individuals, including Angela Bacares, Mr. Lynch’s wife, were saved after boarding the lifeboat.
Karsten Borner, the captain of a boat called Sir Robert BP, who played a pivotal role in the rescue mission, elaborated on how they noticed the emergency flare being fired from a life raft. He mentioned while speaking to Sky News that they noticed the absence of Bayesian’s presence and it was also missing on the radar, indicating that something had gone terribly wrong.
He relayed that it wasn’t until they sent out the tender that they discovered the life raft, which had room for 12, was accommodating 15 people, including a baby. The authorities have interrogated James Cutfield, the captain of the ship, for two hours, kick-starting the questioning process with the crew members.
Firefighter units from Italy’s Vigili del Fuoco affirmed that divers are entering the ship through existing openings, as opposed to creating new ones. The operation also includes the use of remotely operated underwater vehicles, along with naval units and cave divers, according to statements by the Italian Coastguard.
The vessel, known as Bayesian, was anchored approximately half a mile from the shoreline of Porticello. It sunk on Monday around 5am, local time, during a storm. The remains of the Bayesian now lie 50 metres deep on the ocean floor off the coast. Firefighters have termed the mission as “intricate”, with divers permitted to stay underwater for limited periods of twelve minutes.
The yacht journey was in celebration of Mr Lynch’s exoneration from a substantial fraud case in the USA. Mr Lynch, who is the founder of software giant, Autonomy, which was established in 1996, was absolved of potential fraudulent activities related to the sale of his firm to American corporation, Hewlett Packard, in June.
In connection, but separate, Stephen Chamberlain, Mr Lynch’s co-accused in the American fraud trial, was struck and killed by a vehicle while he was out jogging in Cambridgeshire, UK, on the preceding Saturday, as reported by PA.