A body believed to be that of British tech tycoon Mike Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter was found in the wreckage of the Bayesian superyacht Friday — as Italian authorities reportedly launched a manslaughter probe into what caused the tragedy.
Rescue divers located the sixth and final missing person on the sunken vessel around noon local time off the coast of Sicily after a huge five-day search and rescue mission, the Italian Coast Guard said.
The woman’s body hasn’t officially been identified but Lynch’s daughter, Hannah, is the only passenger still unaccounted for.
Recovery efforts were still underway to retrieve the body.
The fire brigade described the rescue operations — which involved more than 400 people, including 28 specialist divers — as “long and delicate.”
The bodies of the other five dead passengers, including Lynch and New York attorney Christopher Morvillo, were recovered Wednesday and Thursday from inside the hull of the sunken yacht.
Meanwhile, the discovery of the final body came as Italian authorities launched a manslaughter investigation into what downed the $40 million yacht after it was struck by an intense storm early Monday, local media reported.
The Prosecutor’s Office of Termini Imerese had started making inquiries and were looking at a slew of offenses — including “shipwreck and multiple counts of culpable homicide against an unknown person”, sources told Palermo Today.
A judicial probe has also been launched into the sinking, which has baffled naval marine experts who say a boat like the Bayesian, built by Italian high-end yacht manufacturer Perini, should have been able to withstand the storm.
Giovanni Costantino, the founder and chief executive of the Italian Sea Group, which owns Perini, was quick to defend the boat’s construction — instead blaming human error for the deadly disaster.
He said the crew would have had a 16-minute window to avoid the loss of life.
“The torture lasted 16 minutes. It went down, not in one minute as some scientists have said. It went down in 16 minutes. You can see it from the charts, from the AIS [Automatic Identification System] tracking chart,” he told The Financial Times.
What to know after a tornado sank the yacht Bayesian off the coast of Sicily:
- A superyacht capsized off the coast of Sicily after a tornado hit the area early Monday, killing six passengers and leaving one missing.
- British tech tycoon Mike Lynch was identified as one of the bodies pulled from the wreckage. His teenage daughter, Hannah, is still missing.
- Lynch — known as “Britain’s Bill Gates” — had invited guests from Clifford Chance, a legal firm that represented him, and Invoke Capital, his own company, on the voyage, according to the Telegraph.
- Security camera footage shot from 650 feet from where the Bayesian sank Monday shows it disappearing.
- A rare and unexpected “black swan” weather event may have led to the Bayesian’s speedy demise, maritime experts say.
“The captain should have prepared the boat and put it in a state of alert and of safety.”
“Ask yourself – why were none of the Porticello fishermen out that night? A fisherman checks the conditions and a ship doesn’t? The disturbance was completely readable on all the weather maps. It was impossible not to know,” he added.
The sailboat had been carrying 22 passengers and crew when it went down.
Those on board were there to help Lynch celebrate his recent acquittal in a major US fraud trial.
The body of the on-ship chef, Ricardo Thomas, the first confirmed fatality, was discovered shortly after the Bayesian sank.
The others recovered have been confirmed to be Big Apple attorney Christopher Morvillo and his wife, Neda, as well as Morgan Stanley exec Jonathan Bloomer and his wife, Judy.
Lynch’s wife, Angela Bacares, and 14 others — including a 1-year-old child — managed to escape the sinking ship before it capsized.
With Post wires
