missing yacht found

Last missing body from sunken superyacht near Sicily recovered

Divers have been operating inside the yacht for more than two days.

LONDON -- Divers in Italy have recovered the last missing passenger from the superyacht that sunk off the Sicilian coast, ABC News has learned.

Six bodies had been recovered by early Thursday morning but the body of the final missing passenger -- believed to be Hannah Lynch, the 18-year-old daughter of the yacht's owner, British tech tycoon Mike Lynch – was located inside the yacht Friday.

The body is being taken from the pier to Palermo’s Rotoli cemetery for identification.

MORE: 9-month-old dead after being found strapped into safety seat by grandmother in hot car for 8 hours

The list of victims, according to Italian news agency Adnkronos, includes Jonathan Bloomer, the president of Morgan Stanley International; his wife Anne Elizabeth; lawyer Chris Morvillo and his wife Nada; British entrepreneur and yacht owner Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hanna. The ship's cook, Recaldo Thomas, was found on Monday morning.

Mike Lynch's body was recovered from the yacht on Thursday.

Rescue teams had been facing a "very hard" operation to find those still missing after the superyacht sunk on Monday, a spokesperson for the onsite fire brigade teams told ABC News.

The vessel was lost early on Monday in stormy weather around half a mile from the fishing village of Porticello, close to the city of Palermo.

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Divers had been operating inside the yacht for two days, Cari added. "But the job is very hard because there are large obstacles and [we] have to work in very narrow spaces."

"It's a long process and we can only operate in short spells," said Cari. Divers have to be rotated constantly, with each only able to stay underwater for around 12 minutes, he said.

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Two Americans -- Christopher and Neda Morvillo -- were among the missing, ABC News confirmed on Tuesday.

Christopher Morvillo is a partner at law firm Clifford Chance and represented Lynch in his recent fraud case brought by Hewlett Packard. He is a former assistant United States attorney for the Southern District of New York.

Editor's note: This story has been corrected to note that the list of victims was provided by Italian news agency Adnkronos and not the Palermo prosecutor's office.

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Five bodies found inside superyacht that sank off Sicily

PORTICELLO, Sicily — Divers recovered four bodies Wednesday from inside a superyacht that sank in a sudden storm off Sicily , Salvatore Cocina, director of the island's Civil Protection Agency, confirmed to NBC News.

Cocina later confirmed to Sky News that a fifth body had been found and was being brought to shore. One passenger remains missing.

The identities of the bodies were not immediately released. Their recovery follows a dayslong search in the deep waters off Italy where British tech tycoon Mike Lynch  and several others were believed to be trapped in the hull. Fifteen of the 22 people aboard survived.

The rest had been missing since early Monday, when the Bayesian was caught in the storm anchored off the coast of Porticello, a village near the Sicilian capital city, Palermo.

The body of the ship’s cook, identified as Recaldo Thomas, a Canadian Antiguan national, was recovered Monday. 

On Wednesday, NBC News witnessed what appeared to be at least three body bags being lifted from fire department boats after they pulled into port at Porticello. It was unclear whose bodies they were. Some were later transferred to ambulances and driven away from the dock.

Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter, Hannah; Morgan Stanley International Chairman Jonathan Bloomer and his wife, Judy; and Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo and his wife, Neda, are also missing. 

The Bayesian is owned by a firm linked to Lynch’s wife, Angela Bacares, who was among the survivors rescued by a nearby vessel after they got into a lifeboat.

Built by the Italian shipbuilder Perini Navi in 2008, the U.K.-registered yacht could carry 12 guests and a crew of up to 10, according to online specialist boating sites. Its nearly 250-foot mast is the tallest aluminum sailing mast in the world, according to CharterWorld Luxury Yacht Charters.  

Regularly described in U.K. media as “Britain’s Bill Gates,” Lynch was  acquitted of fraud by a San Francisco jury this year, stemming from the sale of his software company Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard for $11 billion in 2011.

The Mediterranean sailing vacation was designed to be a celebration for Lynch, who brought Bloomer, who testified in his defense, and Morvillo, one of his U.S. lawyers, on the trip.

Lynch's co-defendant Stephen Chamberlain was not aboard the Bayesian, but in what appears to be a tragic coincidence, a  car struck and killed  him Saturday as he was jogging in a village about 68 miles north of London, local police said.

Claudio Lavanga and Claudia Rizzo reported from Porticello. Henry Austin reported from London.

Claudio Lavanga is Rome-based foreign correspondent for NBC News.

Claudia Rizzo is an Italy based journalist.

Henry Austin is a senior editor for NBC News Digital based in London.

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Mike Lynch’s Body Is Found After Sicily Yacht Sinking, Official Says

The authorities have recovered the bodies of all but one of the six people missing after disaster struck a yacht carrying the British software tycoon.

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By Emma Bubola and Elisabetta Povoledo

Emma Bubola reported from Porticello, Italy, and Elisabetta Povoledo from Pallanza, Italy.

The body of the British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch was among those recovered by Italian divers, an official in the Sicilian capital, Palermo, said on Thursday, confirming that he was killed when a violent storm struck his yacht this week.

Of the 22 people on board the yacht, which had anchored off the Sicilian coast early Monday, when it sank, nine crew members and six passengers survived.

As of Thursday afternoon, Italian recovery teams had retrieved the bodies of the one remaining crew member and five passengers who had been on the yacht, which now lies in 165 feet of water near the port of Porticello, and were searching for one more passenger.

The death of Mr. Lynch was confirmed by Massimo Mariani, the prefect of Palermo, who said that the remaining missing person was the technology entrepreneur’s daughter Hannah.

The others victims were Jonathan Bloomer, the chairman of Morgan Stanley International; his wife, Judy Bloomer; Christopher J. Morvillo, a lawyer at Clifford Chance; and his wife, Neda Morvillo.

“This is an unimaginable grief to shoulder,” the Bloomer family said in a statement. “Our parents were incredible people.”

The Morvillo family said it was “completely devastated by the passing of Chris and Neda,” and added, “Their passing is a tremendous loss.”

The yacht was caught in a sudden downpour. Weather experts said that strong winds and lightning had hit the area and that the yacht had most likely been struck by air generated within a thunderstorm descending rapidly or by a waterspout , similar to a tornado over water.

12 guests occupied the yacht’s six cabins. There were also 10 crew members.

Open hatches, doors and cabin windows could have let in water during a storm, according to the manufacturer.

Open hatches, doors and

cabin windows could

have let in water

during a storm,

according to the

manufacturer.

Source: Superyacht Times, YachtCharterFleet, MarineTraffic

By Veronica Penney

Rescue teams involving deep sea divers with the Italian firefighters’ corps, coordinated by the coast guard, as well as helicopters and rescue ships, had worked to reach the hull of the ship, which had settled on its side on the sea floor.

Carlo Dall’Oppio, the national head of Italy’s firefighters, said on Thursday that the boat was tilted by 90 degrees on the sea bottom. He said the bodies had been found “in the cabins,” although it remained unclear if they were all found in the same one.

The rescue teams recovered four bodies on Wednesday and one on Thursday, bringing them ashore in body bags in front of a crowd of reporters and onlookers.

The priority remained “the recovery of the missing body,” said Mr. Mariani. Once that search is completed, the judicial authorities would decide the next steps, he said.

The bodies recovered so far were already at the disposal of prosecutors, he said, “and then there is the investigative phase,” which would include the recovery of the yacht.

The Italian prosecutors handling the case have attracted strong criticism from the local press association because of their reluctance to share any information with reporters.

As of Thursday, they had not held a news conference or released a statement on the investigation, generating what the Sicilian press association called “a black market of news” that made it hard to verify information.

Finally, on Thursday afternoon, Ambrogio Cartosio, the prosecutor handling the case, said that a news conference would be held at 10 a.m. on Saturday in the town of Termini Imerese, the location of his office.

Mr. Mariani said the operations to recover the bodies had gone quickly, taking into account that the divers had a limited amount of time — about 12 minutes — to operate before coming up.

“It was complicated and also potentially dangerous for the divers,” he said, because of the size of the yacht. “There are objective difficulties; thankfully, they are well trained and know what they are doing.”

Michael J. de la Merced contributed reporting from London.

Emma Bubola is a Times reporter based in Rome. More about Emma Bubola

Elisabetta Povoledo is a reporter based in Rome, covering Italy, the Vatican and the culture of the region. She has been a journalist for 35 years. More about Elisabetta Povoledo

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Everyone from the sunken yacht off Sicily has now been accounted for

Bill Chappell

Dive and recovery teams searched for a final missing person off Porticello harbor near Palermo on Aug. 22, three days after the British-flagged luxury yacht Bayesian sank. ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP via Getty Images/AFP hide caption

Italian authorities say the bodies of all seven people who died after a sailing yacht sank on Monday have now been recovered. The final discovery was announced on Friday; the other six bodies had been found after the calamity.

Tech mogul Mike Lynch is among the people whose bodies were recovered from the sailing yacht, called Bayesian. The massive yacht sank in a violent storm along the shore of Sicily early on Monday.

Italian divers on Friday recovered the body of Lynch’s daughter Hannah, 18, who was the last person unaccounted for.

Lynch’s body was identified on Thursday, according to The Associated Press and other news outlets, citing the Italian coast guard. The agency did not immediately respond to messages from NPR.

The sea rescue operation included 123 dives, according to the Italian fire brigade . Robotic craft have also been used in the search.

Local newspaper Giornale di Sicilia reports that Lynch’s daughter, Hannah, 18, is believed to be the only remaining missing person from the calamity.

15 people survived the catastrophe

Bayesian, with a length of more than 180 feet, had 22 passengers and crew aboard when it sank in the pre-dawn hours of Monday morning. Eyewitness accounts cited a waterspout — a highly localized spiraling storm that’s essentially a marine tornado. One body was found, and 15 survivors made it to safety. That left six people unaccounted for.

Since then, the Italian Coast Guard has been working to find survivors -- and as time passed, what started as a rescue effort became a recovery operation to retrieve bodies from inside the sunken ship.

The Palermo Coast Guard told NPR that the operation has been complicated by the depth and position of the hull, which lies on the seabed at a depth of around 50 meters, about a half-mile from the port in Porticello, Sicily.

Who were the missing people?

The six passengers who had been unaccounted for include Lynch and his daughter, along with Morgan Stanley International Chairman Jonathan Bloomer and his wife. Judy. A lawyer for Lynch named Chris Morvillo, and his wife, Neda, were also missing in the days after the yacht sank.

One member of the crew -- Recaldo Thomas, the yacht’s chef -- also went missing. Local news reports have suggested it was Thomas’ body that was found soon after the ship sank.

Who survived the sinking?

Survivors include Lynch's wife, Angela Bacares, along with Charlotte Golunski, who works at Invoke Capital, Lynch’s venture capital firm. Golunski was on the ship with her daughter, Sofia, who had just celebrated her first birthday.

In an interview with La Repubblica , Golunski said that as the ship sank, she used all her strength to hold her arms above water and prevent Sofia from drowning. Sofia’s father was also onboard and survived.

Ayla Ronald, a lawyer who worked on Lynch’s fraud case, and her partner also escaped the wreck. Other survivors include several crew members, including two women in their early 20s who were part of the ship’s staff.

Who was Mike Lynch?

Lynch, 59, was the founder of Autonomy, a search engine and software company. Hewlett-Packard bought Autonomy for $11 billion in 2011, but Lynch then faced accusations — and then federal fraud charges — that he had misrepresented his company’s financial health and prospects. Lynch denied the claims, saying HP was blaming him for its own problems.

This past June, a lengthy trial in San Francisco ended with Lynch’s acquittal of all charges against him , after he testified on his own behalf. The sailing voyage along the coast of Sicily has been portrayed as a celebration of the end of the court case.

4 bodies found inside the Bayesian, Mike Lynch family yacht, amid search

Four bodies were recovered inside the Bayesian superyacht on Wednesday, more than two days after it sank off the coast of Italy , setting off an exhaustive search for six missing people, including British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch .

Two of the bodies discovered earlier on Wednesday were brought to shore. One body recovered was a heavily built man, Reuters reported.

Six of the ship's 22 passengers, including Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter, went missing after the yacht plunged under the water just before 5 a.m. on Monday as a storm swept across the area. Americans are among the missing, officials have said.

The U.K.-registered yacht belonged to Lynch's wife, Angela Bacares, who was also on board and was rescued. The tech tycoon was recently acquitted on fraud charges after a year under house arrest.

Ricardo Thomas, the ship's cook, was found dead on Monday, according to the coast guard.

The rescue mission saw a diving team, helicopters and multiple coast guard ships deployed to search the water. Fifteen people were pulled from the water on Monday, and eight were hospitalized in stable condition.

A 'black swan event'? Experts puzzle over why Bayesian yacht sank

An investigation opened by local prosecutors into the cause of the disaster is ongoing. Experts have pointed to a water spout, a tornado over the water that can travel up to 120 mph, that formed during the storm, as well as the heavy weight of ship's mast, one of the largest in the world.

The 184-feet-long ship was made by Italian ship manufacturer Perini in 2008.

Lynch set off on the cruise late last month to celebrate his acquittal on fraud charges in the U.S. that marked a decade of legal challenges, the Associated Press reported .

One of his lawyers and a character witness for Lynch during the trial were also on board and vanished when the boat went down. Authorities have not yet disclosed the identities of the four people found.

Here are the passengers who were declared missing.

Mike Lynch and Hannah Lynch

Mike Lynch, 59, is co-founder of Britain’s largest enterprise software, Autonomy, which was sold to Hewlett-Packard in 2011, and founder of venture capital fund Invoke Capital. 

Sometimes known as “Britain’s Bill Gates,” Lynch was slapped with charges after HP said it had uncovered deceit and a major accounting scandal within the firm. He spent a year on house arrest after being extradited from the UK.

In early June, at the end of a 12-week trial, a San Francisco jury acquitted Lynch of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. He was also cleared on a charge of securities fraud later that month.

Lynch and Bacares have two daughters and six dogs, all named after engineering parts, according to the U.K.’s Sunday Times in a profile of Lynch from last month.

Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter, Hannah, was also among the missing. She was preparing to study English literature at Oxford University, according to the Sunday Times. 

Hannah is the younger of Mike Lynch’s two daughters, the Times reported . Mike Lynch told the outlet that his daughters had grown up with their father being publicly accused of fraud. 

Jonathan Bloomer and Judy Bloomer

Jonathan Bloomer is the non-executive chairman of both Morgan Stanley International and the insurer Hiscox, among other companies. Bloomer acted as a character witness on Lynch’s behalf during his fraud trial. 

Hiscox Chief Executive Aki Hussain told Reuters in a statement that the firm was deeply shocked and saddened and their thoughts were with all those affected. 

Bloomer’s twin brother, Jeremy, told BBC that he is processing the news and the family is waiting to hear updates.

“He was my elder by half an hour, so, it means a lot when you lose a twin brother,” Jeremy Bloomer told BBC. “We’ll still wait and see, so it’s fingers crossed.”

Jonathan Bloomer’s wife, Judy, is a psychotherapist of nearly three decades and former teacher. She specializes in anxiety and stress. She studied English language and literature at Homerton College in Cambridge.

Christopher Morvillo and Neda Morvillo

A lawyer with Clifford Chance, Chris Morvillo was among the team that represented Mike Lynch during his trial. Morvillo is an American citizen. 

He was an assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York from 1999 to 2005, and he worked on the criminal investigation stemming from the 9/11 terrorist attacks. 

Morvillo was a graduate of Fordham University School of Law and Villanova University. 

Neda Morvillo, his wife, owns a hand-crafted jewelry company under her maiden name, Neda Nassiri. The company’s website said she has been designing and making jewelry for over 20 years.

In a post on LinkedIn after the conclusion of Lynch’s trial, Chris Morvillo acknowledged his family for their support during the case. 

“And, finally, a huge thank you to my patient and incredible wife, Neda Morvillo, and my two strong, brilliant, and beautiful daughters, Sabrina Morvillo and Sophia Morvillo.  None of this would have been possible without your love and support. I am so glad to be home. 

And they all lived happily ever after…."

Contributing: Reuters

Superyacht sinks latest: Investigators reveal where bodies were found as probe looks at 'crew's responsibility'

Italian officials revealed at a news conference there could be "a question of manslaughter" as they opened a shipwreck investigation and said the probe is also looking at the "crew's responsibility".

Saturday 24 August 2024 18:33, UK

• Superyacht sinking

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• Prosecutor: There 'could be a question of manslaughter'
• Probe 'concentrating' on crew's responsibility
• Seven bodies recovered after five-day search of superyacht wreckage off Sicily
• Saturday's papers pay tribute to youngest victim Hannah Lynch
• Hannah's sister pays tribute to 'my little angel'
• Explained: Inside the superyacht | What challenges have faced divers?
• Eyewitness: Sombre scenes greet rescue teams as final body is brought ashore
• Live reporting by Niamh Lynch

We're ending our live coverage for this evening but here is a recap of what we know:

• Prosecutors have opened a manslaughter investigation into the Bayesian sinking;
• Officials have revealed more details on their investigation and the difficult five-day rescue mission;
• The six bodies found during the search in recent days were all in cabins on the left-hand - and highest - side of the ship. Five were found in the first cabin and the sixth was found in the third;
• Prosecutors said the six passengers were most likely asleep when the boat sank;
• The probe is now focusing on the crew and their responsibilities, with the captain set to undergo more questioning.

Monday 19 August

The Bayesian yacht, flying a British flag, sinks at around 5am local time when the area was hit by a tornado.

Fifteen people are rescued from the 56 metre vessel - including a mother and baby - but another seven remain missing.

One body, later confirmed to be the yacht's chef Recaldo Thomas, is found near the wreck.

It emerges that British technology tycoon Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah are among six people that remain missing.

Tuesday 20 August

The search continues for the six tourists missing.

It is reported that among those missing are Morgan Stanley International chairman Jonathan Bloomer; his wife, Judy Bloomer; Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo; and his wife, Neda Morvillo.

Police divers try to reach the hull of the ship, resting at a depth of 50 metres.

Italy's fire brigade Vigili del Fuoco say early inspections of the wreck were "unsuccessful" because of limited access to the bridge and furniture obstructing passages.

The operation is later described as "complex", with divers limited to 12-minute underwater shifts.

Tributes pour in for Mr Thomas, with his friend Gareth Williams saying: "I can talk for everyone that knew him when I say he was a well-loved, kind human being with a calm spirit."

Wednesday 21 August

The search for the six people unaccounted for enters a third day, with crews carrying out inspections of the yacht's internal hull.

A team of four British inspectors from the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) arrive in Porticello to look at the site of the sinking.

A helicopter is drafted in to help with the search effort and remotely controlled underwater vehicles are being used, with naval units and cave divers also taking part in the search.

Five bodies are found inside the yacht on Wednesday afternoon. Only four of them are brought to shore.

Body bags are seen being taken to Porticello in the afternoon where dozens of emergency services staff wait.

Searches finish for the day just before 7.30pm.

Thursday 22 August

The search resumes for the remaining missing person.

The body of the fifth missing person, found but not recovered the previous day, is brought to shore.

A fire service boat with flashing blue lights returns with a blue body bag to the port of Porticello just after 8.45am local time on Thursday.

Tributes pour in for Mr Lynch and Mr and Mrs Bloomer after they are identified as having died.

The search is called off at around 8pm in Sicily, with divers expected to begin again at 6.30am on Friday.

Friday 23  August

The search continues for the final person missing from the wreck of the Bayesian, Hannah Lynch.

Vincenzo Zagarola, of the Italian Coastguard, says the search for Hannah has not been "easy or quick", comparing the sunken yacht to an "18-storey building full of water".

The coastguard confirms in the late morning that her body has been found.

A green body bag is brought to the port of Porticello from the site of the sinking.

A spokesperson announces on behalf of the Lynch family that they are "devastated" and "in shock" after the deaths of Mike and Hannah.

Hannah's sister Esme pays tribute to her "little angel".

Saturday 24 August

A press conference is held in the court of an Italian town, Termini Imerese.

Public prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio tells reporters that his office has opened an initial investigation against unknown persons into manslaughter and negligent shipwreck.

As the focus now turns to the manslaughter investigation, here's another reminder of the seven victims of the sinking and the 15 people who survived. 

A close friend of the Lynch family has added to the chorus of tributes for British tech tycoon Mike Lynch, who died in Monday's superyacht sinking.

Susannah Gurdun, who lives in Suffolk, recalled being "daunted" when she first met Mr Lynch at a dinner party, before discovering he was "so much more than the corporate cliche".

"He was riveting.  He was funny, and kind, and endlessly interesting; capable of talking about anything and everything," she said.

Ms Gardun said the businessman also had a "thrilling ability" to make complicated subjects "accessible to those of us less blessed with a science acumen".

"In particular, he was wonderful with children.  I will never forget hearing him explain to a group of them - including our ten year old son - the physics of why the sky went pink at sunset," she said.

She went on describe Mr Lynch as a "true genius" and "phenomenal creative".

Ms Gardun said his daughter Hannah was also showing "serious literary promise", and added that it was "beyond tragic that we will never know where her own particular brilliance might have led".

"I still feel blessed to have shared that time with them in Spain.  Not just because I witnessed Mike’s incredible storytelling; but because I was given a chance of understanding what that moment said about all four of them as a united vibrant loving family," she said.

"He was an extraordinary human being and it was - truly - a privilege to have known him."

A yacht crew member who survived the sinking has paid tribute to Hannah Lynch, calling her a "diamond in a sea of stars".

Sasha Murray, chief stewardess of the Bayesian, has released a statement after divers recovered the final missing body from the wreckage, which is believed to be 18-year-old Hannah.

"Those who knew her will know that Hannah was a diamond in a sea of stars," she said.

"Bright, beautiful and always shining. What most people may not have seen was the extraordinarily strong, deep and loving relationship she shared with her parents, whom she adored more than anything. 

"While swimming with them she often said, if anything ever happened she would save them. 

"I have no doubt that the Irish, Latina fire that burns in her soul kept that spirited determination alive."

Ms Murray's statement comes as a new image of Hannah Lynch and her father Mike Lynch is released:

Prosecutors announced in this morning's news conference that they have opened a manslaughter and negligent shipwreck investigation.

Officials were unable to answer several queries from the media, saying they needed time to establish the facts, but what are the key questions facing prosecutors? 

Why weren't passengers who remained on board the vessel warned about escaping from the yacht?

The prosecutor in charge of the case, Raffaele Cammarano, suggested that some passengers may have been asleep when others were awake.

Asked why they were not woken up or alerted, he said that is something investigators are trying to work out from the statements of the survivors.

He called it an "essential" part of the inquiry.

Why were several of the passengers in one cabin?

The press conference heard several bodies onboard the sunken yacht were found in a single cabin which was not theirs.

Mr Cammarano said investigators currently do not know the reason for them being discovered in the same cabin.

The chief of the Palermo fire service, Bentivoglio Fiandra, said the yacht pinned to the right and suggested people tried to go on the other side, taking refuge in cabins in the higher part of the wreck.

Why did the boat sink?

The vessel had been deemed "unsinkable" by its manufacturer - Italian shipyard Perini Navi.

The Bayesian was hit by a downburst, according to Mr Cammarano, which are powerful winds that descend from a thunderstorm and spread out quickly once they hit the ground.

Officials will look into the safety equipment on the sunken vessel.

Mr Cammarano was asked about whether there is a black box and if the hatches were left open.

He said investigators do not have exact information about the black box and that the first phase of the inquiry will look into it.

Why were nearby vessels not similarly affected?

Another yacht, the Sir Robert BP, was about 150 to 200 metres from the Bayesian when extreme weather hit.

Its crew helped to rescue 15 people from the stricken vessel.

Italian officials said they would be looking at how the downburst could affect one vehicle and not other nearby vessels.

What weather warnings was the Bayesian alerted to?

Maritime director of western Sicily, Rear Admiral Raffaele Macauda, said the weather at the time of the yacht's sinking was abnormal and there was nothing to suggest such an extreme situation would arise.

He said there were forecasts of winds and a storm alert, but there was no warning of a tornado.

"Given that the conditions were such, there wasn't anything to suggest there could be an extreme situation arising," he said.

"There are vessels that can monitor, after all, these events and one would have thought that the captain had taken precautions."

How long will it take to recover the sailing vessel?

Mr Macauda could not confirm how long it would take to retrieve the shipwreck of the sunken yacht.

"Everything depends on the availability of the owners and the timeframe of the retrieval of the wreck and of course all that has to be submitted to the port authorities and in parallel of course there will be the inquiry results and it's only really then that we will be able to authorise the operation," he said.

"I can't say, like some experts who have already spoken on the subject, [said] that it will be eight weeks."

He made clear that the owners will bear the full cost of retrieval, although he could not estimate the figure.

Italian authorities detailed the challenging and meticulous rescue operation to recover the six missing people from the Bayesian wreck (see 9.18am post).

But why was the five-day search so difficult? 

Read more below...

More on this morning's press conference. 

One of the main updates from prosecutors was that they have opened manslaughter and shipwreck investigations after the deaths of seven people in the Bayesian sinking. 

Watch the announcement below...

Prosecutors have given a lengthy news conference this morning on their investigation into the sinking of the Bayesian. 

Read the full report on the prosecutors' probe below...

Marine investigator James Wilkes has been speaking to Sky News after this morning's press conference.

"Naturally, there are more questions than there are substantive answers at the moment - that's the nature of investigative work.

"Something forced that yacht to roll beyond its nominal stability limits, such that it wasn't able to right itself with the ingress of a certain amount of seawater that was coming into the yacht. 

"So the investigators are going to ask themselves one initial question - what must the conditions have been for this to happen? 

"Then they are going to look at the contributing factors to the yacht, sinking, and, and the unfortunate loss of life." 

Prosecutors said this morning that the future of the investigation is reliant on recovering the wreck. 

Mr Wilkes said the yacht is a "major piece of physical evidence in and of itself." 

"It's lying at 50 metres, which is a recoverable depth. 

"If it was significantly deeper, then I'm not sure they'd be considering salvage at this stage or certainly, the salvage question would be a lot more complicated to answer. 

"But if there was the ability to raise that yacht in one piece safely, then it gives the investigators physically more to look at."

Mr Wilkes said he was unsure if the yacht would have a "black box" - called a voyage data recorder in shipping. 

"It would record things like GPS position, heading speed, engine telemetry, whether the radars were on, what they were recording, alarms, communications from the yacht itself, any audio on the bridge.

"But more often than not, these are on merchant ships. The yacht was a commercial yacht in the sense that it could be chartered out so it's quite possible it has a voyage data recorder on, but I'm not sure that it does. I don't know that as a matter of fact," he said.

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5th body recovered from Mike Lynch's family yacht off Sicily as questions mount over luxury vessel's sinking

By Anna Matranga

Updated on: August 22, 2024 / 10:48 AM EDT / CBS News

Rome — Divers recovered the body of a fifth victim of the Bayesian superyacht wreck Thursday morning, Sicily Civil Protection Chief Salvo Cocina confirmed to CBS News, and the Reuters news agency cited Italian Interior Ministry official Massimo Mariani as saying it was the body of Mike Lynch, the British tech magnate whose wife owned the vessel.

Italian Coast Guard spokesperson Vincenzo Zagarola told CBS News that teams were still working to recover the body of the sixth and final person left missing when the boat went down. The six bodies had remained stuck inside the 184-foot luxury yacht for days after it sank early Monday morning off the coast of Palermo, Sicily in a severe thunderstorm.

Four bodies were retrieved Wednesday from the Bayesian, which was resting on the seafloor at a 90 degree angle at a depth of over 160 feet. The vessel's position and items that moved around inside the ill-fated yacht made recovery efforts slow and hazardous.

Italian authorities have not officially identified the remains recovered from the Bayesian, which belonged to Lynch's wife Angela Bacares. She was among the 15 people who managed to escape from the boat as it sank quickly on Monday morning, but Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah were among those left missing.

Another victim, the Bayesian superyacht's chef, was found dead soon after the boat capsized. 

Along with Lynch and his daughter, the technology mogul's American lawyer Chris Morvillo and his wife Neda, and British banker Jonathan Bloomer and his wife, were believed to have been trapped in the yacht when it sank.

Questions as to how the state-of-the-art boat could have gone down so quickly have mounted steadily since the accident. 

Italian media were reporting Thursday that, after questioning survivors and witnesses, Italian prosecutors had opened an official investigation into a possible "culpable shipwreck." No individuals had been named as potential suspects.

On Thursday, Giovanni Costantino, head of the Italian Sea Group, which owns the company Perini Navi, which built the Bayesian in 2008, blamed human error.

"A Perini ship resisted Hurricane Katrina, a Category 5 [hurricane]. Does it seem to you that it can't resist a tornado from here?" he remarked to the newspaper Corriere della Sera. "It is good practice when the ship is at anchor to have a guard on the bridge, and if there was one he could not have failed to see the storm coming. Instead, it took on water with the guests still in the cabin. ... They ended up in a trap, those poor people ended up like mice."

One possible factor could have been that the ship's keel — a fin-like structure that sticks out from the bottom of the boat, designed to provide stability and counterweight to the huge mast — was not fully deployed. The yacht had a retractable keel that could be raised for entry into shallow harbors. But a raised keel at sea would have made the ship much more vulnerable to instability in the strong winds that struck early Monday morning.

When asked whether divers had seen the ship's keel in a raised position, a spokesman for the Italian Coast Guard told CBS News that only the prosecutor investigating the incident could confirm such information but that the Coast Guard "was not denying" it. 

The ship's captain, 51-year-old New Zealand national James Cutfileld, was questioned for two hours by prosecutors on Thursday, according to Italian media.

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