Divers searching the wreckage of a superyacht that sank off Sicily have identified the five bodies recovered from the wreck so far, including those of British technology magnate Mike Lynch and Morgan Stanley International CEO Jonathan Bloomer.
According to AFP reporters, specialized divers using an underwater robot recovered four bodies from the wreck of the “Bayesian” on Wednesday, and another was added on Thursday morning.
The five identified bodies are:
- British technology tycoon Mike Lynch
- Jonathan Bloomer, Chairman of Morgan Stanley Bank International
- Judy Bloomer, Jonathan’s wife
- Chris Morvillo, attorney at Clifford Chance
- Neda Morvillo, Chris’ wife
Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter, Hannah Lynch, is still missing.
Read more: Mike Lynch was “Britain’s Bill Gates” – but the late tech millionaire spent many of his last months under house arrest
The 56-metre (185-foot) British-flagged vessel Bayesian was anchored about 700 metres off Porticello when it was hit by a waterspout – similar to a mini-tornado – during a pre-dawn storm.
It sank within minutes.
Fifteen people were rescued, including Lynch’s wife and a woman with a one-year-old baby.
But the technology entrepreneur and his daughter, his lawyer Christopher Morvillo and his wife Neda, and Jonathan Bloomer, the CEO of Morgan Stanley International, and his wife Judy were all reported missing.
Shortly before the news of the discovery of the bodies became known, an AFP reporter observed more than half a dozen boats leaving the port of Porticello at intervals of a few minutes.
Some of them later returned, one carrying a body bag, which was then carried by rescue workers to a tent on the quay.
Firefighters had previously said the search of the yacht, which is largely intact and lies on the seabed at a depth of about 50 metres, was a “long and complex” operation.
Although there were eyewitness reports that the 75-meter-high mast had collapsed, reports on Wednesday suggested that it too had survived the incident.
Five minutes
The passengers were guests of Lynch – an entrepreneur sometimes referred to as Britain’s Bill Gates – to celebrate his acquittal in a massive US fraud trial.
The 59-year-old was acquitted of all charges by a San Francisco court in June after being accused of $11 billion worth of fraud in connection with the sale of his software company Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard.
Among the survivors was Charlotte Golunski, a board member of a company founded by Lynch. She described briefly letting go of her one-year-old daughter before grabbing her again. Both were carried to safety.
Fabio Genco, a Palermo ambulance worker who was part of the team that treated the child, described the “apocalyptic” situation he found when he arrived at the scene.
“The word that the mother and all the injured kept repeating was ‘darkness’, the darkness they experienced during the shipwreck,” he told BBC Newsnight.
“They spoke of about five minutes, maybe three to five minutes, from the moment the boat was lifted by the waves of the sea until it sank.”
He said the rescued survivors were in shock: “They were truly apocalyptic scenes, with everyone searching and hoping to find the people who were not present at that moment or were simply missing.”
All survivors treated in hospital have been discharged, he confirmed.
Anarchic sea conditions
The speed at which the yacht sank and the fact that the other boats in the area were unaffected was extraordinary.
Some important questions remain unanswered, such as whether the keel, which serves as a counterweight to the towering mast, was down when the storm hit.
Matthew Schanck of the Maritime Search and Rescue Council told AFP the incident was “quite unprecedented” and described it as a “black swan event” – something that is unlikely but has major implications.
British meteorologist Peter Inness described a waterspout as “a narrow column of rotating air beneath a thunderstorm that occurs over water.”
Like tornadoes, they suck in air in a rotating motion. Many are fairly insignificant, but some can reach wind speeds of more than 100 kilometers per hour, Inness said.
Jean-Marie Dumon, a former naval officer who now works at the French maritime industry association GICAN, added that wind speeds of 100 km/h or more “can create completely anarchic sea conditions that can lead to capsizing”.
