yacht captain jobs in canada

Yacht Crew Job Board

With Bluewater's expertise in crew training and yacht crew recruitment, finding your ideal yacht crew vacancy is simple. We offer yacht management services to a variety of exclusive superyachts. Our team excels in sourcing top-notch yacht crew positions, spanning from 25-meter private yachts in the Bahamas to 50-metre charter yachts in the Mediterranean to luxurious 100+ metre superyachts navigating the globe extensively.

48 yacht crew jobs available now.

Yacht Crew Training

Alongside sourcing the latest yacht crew jobs worldwide, Bluewater offers a range of specialised yacht crew training courses. Whether you're new to the superyacht industry seeking entry-level qualifications, an experienced deckhand or engineer aiming to advance your career, or a dedicated crew member looking to enhance your resume with certifications like HELM (Human Element Leadership and Management), Yachtmaster, or OOW (Officer of the Watch), explore our comprehensive yacht crew training options.

Working on a Luxury Yacht

Working as a crew member on a superyacht is undeniably one of the most rewarding yet demanding professions, calling for hard work, dedication, and professional training. The opportunities within the yachting industry are vast, and at Bluewater, we are committed to helping every crew member discover their ideal yacht crew position. Our recruitment division focuses on finding the perfect yacht for crew members and provides unparalleled professional support. Our recruitment experts guide crew members through every step of their yachting career journey, ensuring they receive the best possible assistance.

Manage Your Yacht Career

Whether you're seeking a yacht crew position as a deckhand, engineer, onboard masseuse, stewardess, chef, chief stewardess, purser, first officer, or captain, take control of your yacht career. Create a profile and join one of the world's largest yachting communities for free.

48 JOBS FOUND

• Qualifications: Y3 or Commercial Equivalent
• Experience: 3 Years +
• Salary: DOE
• Qualifications: STCW, ENG1, Food Hygiene Level 2
• Experience: 2 Years +
• Salary: 6000EUR
• Qualifications: Master 500gt
• Experience: Experience on yachts 30m+
• Salary: tbc
• Qualifications: Yachtmaster Offshore (comm. endorsed), STCW, ENG1
• Experience: at least 1-2 seasons’
• Salary: 3000 EUR
• Qualifications: OOW 3000GT, GMDSS Advanced Fire fighting, PWC Instructor (ideally)
• Experience: at least 1 year in a similar position
• Salary: 6000 EUR
• Permanent or Temp
• Qualifications: Y2
• Salary: Up to €7000 (DOE)
• Qualifications: STCW, ENG1, Food & Hygiene Level 2
• Experience: 1-2 seasons
• Qualifications: Master 500GT or OOW >3000GT
• Qualifications: Minimum YM Offshore, preferred OOW3000GT
• Salary: 6000EUR (DOE)
• Experience: Open
• Salary: 5000 to 5500EUR (DOE)

How to Become a Boat Captain in Canada

Ship’s Captain is as much a dream job as it is a job of the future. Boating around the world and constantly interacting with diverse cultures, the sea captain remains, in the popular mind, a profession of excellence. Although this image of “captain” reigns supreme in our minds, we tend to overlook the complex and competitive path that aspiring captains must face.

In this article, discover the different steps to become a boat captain in Canada.

What does a boat captain do?

By rank within the Navy, a ship’s captain has various duties and responsibilities. Often starting with a navigation officer’s license or as a deck officer, they learn the basics of their future job as captain. This includes learning about the different parts of a boat , nautical safety equipment , navigation tools such as the magnetic compass , as well as safety maneuvers.

Beyond that, once a boat captain has completed their training, they become the sole master on board the boat they sail, regardless of the type of vessel. They must then command ships, ensure the safety of passengers and crews, and make all decisions that apply to a specific situation.

For a quick comparison, the captain is the equivalent of a company director making all the decisions in order to maintain the successful operation of the company.

What skills and qualities does a boat captain need?

Beyond knowing where port and starboard  are, a captain must possess certain essential qualities:

• Enjoy traveling and working internationally, with a good command of foreign languages
• Have an interest in marine sciences and professions
• Have a good capacity for analysis, synthesis, autonomy and problem solving
• Have good observational, organizational and leadership skills
• Be dynamic, enthusiastic and disciplined
• Be able to work under pressure and stress in order to make the best possible decisions in any situation

In this job, a ship’s captain must be adaptable and have great confidence in their skills. These are the reasons why it is so difficult to obtain a cruise ship captain’s license, and similar rank, even though the demand remains high.

Boat captain job outlook

By obtaining the rank of captain, lieutenants and midshipmen reach the highest rank of the profession. The future prospects, as we can understand them, concern especially the salary progression, which on average tends to be $100,000 per year in Canada.

What sectors can I work in as a boat captain?

There are four sectors and sub-sectors you can expect to work in as a captain:

• Merchant Marine
• Canadian Coast Guard
• Armed Forces
• Passenger Transportation

Training to become a ship captain

To become a ship captain, it is necessary to obtain both formal academic training and gain personal experience in the profession.

Academic streams

Various degrees and certifications are required to obtain a captain’s license and the first of these is a college degree in navigation. This first step allows candidates to pick up the scientific and mathematical basics that are essential in the profession. They will learn the basics of chart reading as well as the various emergency maneuvers (for example, how to deploy different types of boat anchors ).

Once the basics are learned, midshipmen will also be required to complete 12 months of sea training as an officer of the watch, second officer, and first officer in the merchant marine. In order to progress, each grade will be tested at the end of each year of the college diploma. The goal is to apply the theory learned throughout the certification. Once the officer’s certificate is obtained, the midshipman can start his career as a navigation officer (2nd lieutenant).

It is also possible to complete a Bachelor of Technology in Nautical Sciences offered by the Canadian Coast Guard College. Divided between theory and time at sea, the training program offers a more professional approach to the theoretical, mathematical and scientific bases. Contrary to the college diploma, the bachelor’s degree offers more intensive courses in navigation and ship handling.

Military stream

If you are destined for a military career, the training program offered by the Canadian Forces trains midshipmen to become naval warfare officers. This training is more specialized than the bachelor’s degree. The midshipman will then be directly confronted with the real exercise of their duties, after acquiring the required knowledge and skills. Obtaining the rank of captain is faster.

Other diplomas and bachelor’s degrees lead to becoming an aspiring captain. Other streams include bachelor’s degrees in operations and logistics engineering, or in business administration with a specialization in marine transportation.

Experience in the field

The rank of captain, whether for cruise ships or cargo transports, requires a lot of experience.  The experience necessary ranges towards 10 years of active field experience.

Even if you have obtained all the necessary diplomas and certifications for this rank, you will have to progress by passing through as deck officer, towards chief of watch, and other levels. The goal is to gain as much experience as possible, either in the different nautical trades or vessels or the one that really interests you.

Internships, summer work and continuing your theoretical training by taking Transport Canada  exams are all ways to gain new knowledge.  Without personal experience in the field, you are unable to become a ship captain.

Entry-level positions are possible

If you aspire to be a captain of a ship, don’t hesitate to start at the entry-level. The path to becoming a captain is tenuous and requires hard work. Don’t forget about the prospects for the future and for increasing your skills, because these can become opportunities.

Don’t neglect your first job and invest in it as if it will become your permanent position. The skills and experience that you will acquire will be assets that you will be able to put to good use when you change positions or grades.

Start your career with National Boating Safety School

Becoming a boat captain takes time and experience. Being a competitive profession, all experience and training is helpful in achieving your dream job. That’s why we offer the Transport Canada-approved online boating exam  preparation boater safety course .

Register for the boating course now !

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Job requirements ship's captain in canada.

• Description
• Requirements
• Competencies

Find out what you typically need to work as a ship's captain in Canada. These requirements are applicable to all Deck officers, water transport (NOC 72602).

Employment requirements

This is what you typically need for the job.

• Completion of secondary school is required.
• Completion of deck officer cadet program from an approved nautical institute or one to three years of experience as a member of a deck crew is required.
• A deck officer certificate of competency, issued by Transport Canada, is required.
• For ship pilots, a ship pilot licence and a master certificate of competency are required.

Source National Occupational Classification

Professional certification and licensing

We don’t have any data on professional certification requirements. This occupation is not regulated in Canada based on our records.

Source Foreign Credential Recognition Program - ESDC

Do you want to work in another province or territory?

If you are already certified to work in a regulated occupation in your province or territory, it will be easier for you to have your certification recognized in another province or territory. See the Workers Mobility's website to learn more.

Bayesian yacht captain's chilling five words after breaking silence over capsize disaster

A massive search operation is underway as crews from across Italy continue to look for any trace of the people still missing following the sinking of the superyacht

• 09:32, 20 Aug 2024
• Updated 10:12, 20 Aug 2024

The captain of the superyacht has broken his silence with a chilling five-word admission after the vessel sank off the coast of Sicily on Monday.

James Catfield, who captained the boat that sank off the coast of Porticello, near Palermo simply said: "We didn't see it coming." Catfield was described as "limp" as he waited outside an emergency room in the Sicilian town of Termini Imerese.

He was reportedly taken to the town along with four other passengers of the Bayesian. The superyacht , owned by Brit tech tycoon Mike Lynch, sank after being caught up in a storm off the Italian island at about 5am local time on Monday.

It is understood the £30million yacht was little more than 700 metres from the harbour when its mast snapped in the storm, throwing it off balance. One body has been recovered, believed to be the ship's chef, and search teams are preparing to search the vessel for any trace of the missing.

Lynch, his 18-year-old daughter Hannah and several other people are still reported as missing. Others listed as missing include Lynch's lawyer Christopher Morvilla, his wife Nada, Morgan Stanley International chairman Jonathan Bloomer as well as his wife Anne.

Lynch's wife and 14 other people were rescued and survived the disaster. Named survivors include: Sasha Murray, Irish, 29; Frenchman Matthew Griffith, 22, captain of the boat; James Caulfield, New Zealander, 51; Ayla Ronald, 36, from London; and Myin Kyaw Htun, 39, from Myanmar .

Italian rescuers resumed their search for the missing at about 6:30am local time today, according to La Repubblica . British investigators are also set to join the search once they touch down in Palermo later today.

The tragedy comes after Lynch was acquitted earlier this year of conducting massive fraud over the sale of software company Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard, back in 2011. It is understood the disaster happened as Lynch and other passengers celebrated his legal win in court.

Lynch was extradited to the US in 2023, where he said, on being handed over to authorities, they "put chains round me." He ended up being bailed for $100million but on house arrest. He faced two decades in jail had he been convicted of the 17 charges he faced.

The father of Ayla Ronald, a Clifford Chance lawyer who was part of the legal team that represented Lynch in court said she had been celebrating.

"I have texted with my daughter and she hasn't given me any updates about missing personnel or saved personnel" father Lin told The Telegraph . "She has only said to me that there are deaths, and she and her partner are alive."

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Captain Who Saw Yacht Sink in Sicily and Helped Rescue Survivors Calls Incident a 'Big Disaster'

"We noticed that the ship behind us was gone,” Karsten Borner recalled after the storm was over

A boat captain in Sicily recalls saving several survivors just moments after a fatal yacht incident in Italy left at least one person dead and six people missing.

The Bayesian vessel, a 56-meter (183-ft) superyacht carrying 22 people, was anchored when a tornado formed over the water, known as a waterspout, striking the superyacht before it lost its balance and sank, per Sicilian news agency Ansa .

Karsten Borner, who was a captain on a nearby boat, saw the boat sink "a few minutes" after it was hit, he told Italian news outlet Rai, per the BBC .

"It all happened in really little time," he continued.

“The storm was over. We noticed that the ship behind us was gone,” Borner told the BBC in a video interview Monday. “And then we saw a red flare, so my first mate and I went to the position and we found this life raft drifting [with] 15 people inside."

Corpo Nazionale dei Vigili dei del Fuoco via Getty Images

Related: 6 Passengers, Including 2 Americans, Missing After 180-Foot Yacht Sinks amid Storm in Sicily

According to Borner, four people were hurt, including three who sustained severe injuries.

“We brought them to our ship, and then we communicated with the Coast Guard. Then after some time, the Coast Guard came, and later they picked the injured people [up],” the captain of the nearby ship said.

Borner recalled using a light to see that the Bayesian was overturned. He noted that there was a “little baby” in the life raft, later identified as a 1-year-old English girl named Sophie .

"It was a big disaster," he concluded.

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer​​, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

Vincenzo Pepe/Getty

The child was transported to the Children's Hospital of Palermoper Ansa, per Corriere Della Sera . Her mother was identified to PEOPLE by local authorities as Charlotte Golunski.

Golunski told the Italian newspaper la Repubblica she briefly lost Sophie due to the turbulent sea but later found her.

"I held her afloat with all my strength, my arms stretched upwards to keep her from drowning,” the mother told the newspaper.

She added, "It was all dark. In the water, I couldn't keep my eyes open. I screamed for help but all I could hear around me was the screams of others."

The baby’s father, James Emsley, survived the incident, an official with Sicily's civil protection agency told Sky News.

At the time the yacht sank, the Coast Guard said 12 passengers were on board as well as 10 crew members, per the Associated Press .

One person was found dead near the yacht and has since been identified as a cook from the boat, according to local outlet Palermo Today and the BBC .

Of the six who are still missing are British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch and his daughter Hannah. His wife, Angela Bacares, was among those rescued, local sources said.

Simon Dawson/Bloomberg via Getty

Just months ago Lynch, the founder of the U.K.-based tech company Autonomy, was acquitted on all charges that alleged he inflated his company's earnings ahead of an $11 billion deal with Hewlett-Packard, per TechCrunch and the Associated Press .

In a statement shared with the outlets at the time, the tech giant said he was "looking forward to returning to the U.K. and getting back to what I love most: my family and innovating in my field.”

PEOPLE has reached out to the Italian Coast Guard for further comment, but they did not immediately respond.

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Read the original article on People .

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Mike lynch, recently acquitted in hp-autonomy fraud case, is missing after yacht capsized off sicily (updated).

Original article continues below. Mike Lynch, the investor and high-profile founder of U.K. tech firm Autonomy, has been declared missing at sea after the yacht he was on, the Bayesian, capsized in a storm off the coast of Sicily early Monday morning. Lynch's wife, Angela Bacares, is one of the 15 who have been rescued.

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Canadian dead, several others missing after superyacht capsizes off Sicilian coast

Mother who survived held 1-year-old daughter above waves until rescue.

Canadian dead, others missing after superyacht sinks near Sicily

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A Canadian man has died after a luxury yacht was struck by an unexpectedly violent storm and sank off the coast of Sicily early on Monday, local officials said.

The British-flagged Bayesian, a 56-metre-long sailboat, was carrying 22 people and was anchored just off shore near the port of Porticello when it was hit by ferocious weather, the Italian coast guard said in a statement.

Eyewitnesses said the superyacht vanished quickly beneath the waves shortly before dawn. Fifteen people escaped before it went down, including a one-year-old girl.

The Palermo Port Authority told CBC News officials recovered the body of Thomas Recaldo, a Canadian-born man who had been living in Antigua. He had been the ship's on-board cook.

The BBC, as well as Italian newspapers Corrierre della Sera and La Republicca, reported the Canadian's name as Ricardo Thomas.

Global Affairs Canada said it was "aware of reports" Canadian citizen had died.

"We extend our deepest sympathies to everyone affected by this tragic event," it said in a statement.

• What we know about the capsized superyacht off the Sicilian coast

Six other people were missing after the sinking, including British tech magnate Mike Lynch, his teenage daughter Hannah and Jonathan Bloomer, president of Morgan Stanley International, La Republicca reported.

The Italian coast guard said those who were missing had British, American and Canadian nationalities.

'The ship behind us was gone'

"The wind was very strong. Bad weather was expected, but not of this magnitude," a coast guard official in the Sicilian capital Palermo told Reuters.

Salvo Cocina of Sicily's civil protection agency said a mini tornado known as a waterspout that forms above the water had struck the area overnight. 

Eight of the 15 people rescued were transferred to local hospitals. All were in a stable condition, local media reported.

One of the survivors, identified as Charlotte Emsley, said she had momentarily lost hold of her one-year-old daughter, Sofia, in the water, but then managed to hold her up over the waves until a lifeboat inflated and they were both pulled to safety, Italian news agency ANSA reported, quoting the mother.

The father, James Emsley, also survived, Cocina said.

The captain of a nearby boat told Reuters that when the storm hit, he turned the engine on to keep control of the vessel and avoid a collision with the Bayesian.

"We managed to keep the ship in position, and after the storm was over, we noticed that the ship behind us was gone," Karsten Borner told journalists.

He said that his crew then found some of the survivors on a life raft, including three who were seriously injured, and took them on board before the coast guard picked them up.

'The ship behind us was gone,' says captain who rescued yacht passengers

Mother saves 1-year-old daughter.

The Bayesian was built by Italian shipbuilder Perini in 2008.

The luxury ship has an aluminum hull and can carry 12 guests and a crew of up to 10, according to online specialist yacht sites.

It was owned by a firm called Revtom Limited, according to the shipspotting.com website. Lynch's wife, Angela Bacares, is named as the sole shareholder of the firm on company documents.

'It was a big disaster,' boater says of storm that capsized luxury yacht

Cocina of the civil protection agency said Bacares was among those rescued, but it wasn't immediately clear if she required hospital treatment.

Lynch, 59, is one of Britain's best-known tech entrepreneurs. He built the country's largest software firm, Autonomy, from his groundbreaking research at Cambridge University. His PhD thesis and the software that made his fortune was based on one of the mathematical theories of English statistician Thomas Bayes, after whom the yacht was named.

Lynch sold the firm to HP in a multibillion-dollar deal in 2011, before the transaction unravelled spectacularly following the acquisition, with the U.S. tech giant accusing him of fraud.

Lynch spent much of the last decade in court defending his name. He was acquitted by a jury in San Francisco in June after he spent more than a year living effectively under house arrest.

In a grim coincidence, one of his co-defendants in the U.S. fraud trial, Autonomy's former vice-president of finance Stephen Chamberlain, was hit by a car while out running in Cambridgeshire on Saturday morning, two days before the Bayesian capsized. He was placed on life support and died Monday, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke with Reuters.

Divers find wreckage

The coast guard said divers were inspecting the wreck of the Bayesian, which was lying at a depth of 49 metres.

Prosecutors in the nearby town of Termini Imerese have opened an investigation to look into what had gone wrong.

Storms and heavy rainfall have swept down Italy in recent days after weeks of scorching heat, which had lifted the temperature of the Mediterranean sea to record levels, raising the risk of extreme weather conditions, experts said.

"The sea surface temperature around Sicily was around 30 C, which is almost three degrees more than normal. This creates an enormous source of energy that contributes to these storms," said meteorologist Luca Mercalli.

"We can't say that this is all due to global warming, but we can say that it has an amplifying effect."

The boat left the Sicilian port of Milazzo on Aug. 14 and was last tracked east of Palermo on Sunday evening, with a navigation status of "at anchor," according to vessel tracking app Vesselfinder.

A U.K. Foreign Ministry spokesperson said British officials were in contact with local authorities over the capsizing and were ready to provide consular support for Britons who were affected.

With files from CBC's Megan Williams and The Associated Press

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Hurricane tracker, severe weather, radar & maps, news & features, winter center, news / weather news, six people missing and one dead after tornado sinks luxury yacht off sicily.

By Barbie Latza Nadeau, CNN

Published Aug 19, 2024 8:40 AM PDT | Updated Aug 19, 2024 8:40 AM PDT

A search operation continued Aug. 19 near Port of Porticello, Italy, for survivors of a British yacht sunk by a tornado. Fifteen people have been rescued from the scene, while 6 remain missing.

(CNN) —  Rescuers were on Monday searching for six people – including British tech tycoon  Mike Lynch  – who went missing after a luxury yacht was hit by a tornado and sank off the coast of Sicily, killing one of the 22 people on board.

The vessel was hit by the tornado at around 5 a.m. Monday, according to a spokesperson for Italy’s Coast Guard. The yacht was anchored about a half a mile from the port of Porticello on the Mediterranean island.

Four Britons and two Americans are among those missing, the spokesperson said.

A source told CNN that Lynch, the founder of software giant Autonomy, was a passenger on the yacht. His wife, Angela Bacares, was rescued. The source spoke to CNN on the condition of anonymity, as they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Emergency crews search the coast off the Italian port of Porticello, on August 19, after a tornado sank a luxury yacht nearby. (Photo credit: Igor Petyx/Reuters via CNN Newsource)

Fifteen others were rescued from the scene and one child was airlifted to the children’s hospital in Palermo. Eight people were hospitalized in total, according to the mayor’s office. One body was found on the hull of the yacht, the Coast Guard said.

A small  waterspout  – one of several types of tornadoes – developed over the area Monday morning, according to a report from the European Severe Weather Database. Other strong storms across Sicily brought torrential rainfall late Sunday, dumping more than 4 inches (100 mm) of rain in less than four hours in Brolo, east of Palermo, in less than four hours.

The weather forecast had warned of potential strong winds, with storms across the entire southern region of Italy Sunday, the Coast Guard spokesperson added.

Rescue workers near Palermo, Italy, close to the scene of the incident. (Photo credit: Igor Petyx/Reuters via CNN Newsource)

One survivor, Charlotte, 35, described how she battled to hold onto her one-year-old daughter, Sofia, reported Italian news agency ANSA, as a barrage of waves sank the yacht.

“In two seconds I lost the baby in the sea, then I immediately hugged her again amidst the fury of the waves. I held her tightly, close to me, while the sea was stormy,” she told journalists. “Many were screaming.”

The captain is among the survivors, the spokesperson for Italy’s Coast Guard said.

The 56-meter yacht called the “Bayesian,” which flies under a British flag, had mostly British passengers and crew, in addition to two Anglo-French, one New Zealander, one Irish and one Sri Lankan, the spokesperson told CNN.

The Italian fire brigade said its divers had reached the yacht’s hull 49 meters (160 feet) below sea level, according to a press statement. The brigade also dispatched helicopters to bolster the search operation.

The captain of a nearby boat said he turned on his engine to avoid crashing into the Bayesian, Reuters reported, as fierce gales swept the area.

“This morning we got this strong gust and we had to start the engine to keep the ship in an angled position,” he told reporters on Monday. “After the storm was over, we noticed that the ship behind us was gone.”

British tycoon among those missing

Lynch, the British entrepreneur missing from the yacht, had been plagued by legal woes  since 2011 , when he sold his company to tech firm Hewlett-Packard (HP) for $11 billion.

In June, he was acquitted of fraud by a jury in San Francisco, after prosecutors accused him of trying to inflate Autonomy’s revenue in the latest chapter of the legal saga.

He turned ground-breaking research at Cambridge University into the foundation of Autonomy, which became Britain’s biggest software company and a member of the blue-chip FTSE 100 index.

Lynch was lauded by academics and scientists and asked to advise the British government on technology and innovation.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

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Search Resumes for Missing Mogul and 5 Others in Yacht Sinking

Divers have been searching the hull of the Bayesian for passengers including the British entrepreneur Mike Lynch. Witnesses said it was hit by a waterspout during a storm off Sicily.

By Elisabetta Povoledo

Deep-sea divers with Italy’s firefighter corps resumed their search on Tuesday morning for six passengers — including a British software mogul and his daughter — who are missing after a yacht sank off the coast of Sicily the previous day.

There were 22 people on board the British-flagged Bayesian, a 180-foot sailing yacht, which was anchored offshore near the port of Porticello when it was hit by what eyewitnesses described as a waterspout, a small tornado on water, during a sudden and very violent storm.

Fifteen people managed to find safety on a raft and were rescued by the captain of a nearby sailing cruise ship.

The body of the ship’s cook was recovered on Monday, but several people are still unaccounted for, according to to Salvatore Cocina, an official with Sicily’s civil protection agency: Mike Lynch, a British technology entrepreneur, and his daughter Hannah; Jonathan Bloomer, chairman of Morgan Stanley International, and his wife; and Christopher J. Morvillo, a lawyer at Clifford Chance, and his wife.

Mr. Lynch was acquitted of fraud in a trial in the United States in June, ending a high-profile, decadelong legal battle against accusations that he had defrauded Hewlett-Packard when he sold it his company, Autonomy, for $11 billion.

The news about Mr. Lynch came just days after Stephen Chamberlain, a former vice president of finance at Autonomy and Mr. Lynch’s co-defendant at his fraud trial, was fatally struck by a car on Saturday while out for a run, his lawyer, Gary S. Lincenberg, said in a statement.

Prosecutors in the city of Termini Imerese, just east of where the yacht went down, have been charged with opening a formal investigation into the sinking and determining what led to it. Reached by telephone, the chief prosecutor declined a request for comment.

The search for the missing passengers began on Monday but was suspended late at night. “Access limited to the bridge deck, with difficulty due to the presence of furnishings obstructing passage,” the Vigili del Fuoco, or firefighters’ corps, wrote on social media .

Divers resumed the search on Tuesday, even as helicopters and ships trawled the waters near the site, the firefighters’ corps said in a statement.

The ship was lying on its right side, at a depth of about 165 feet, meaning that divers, working in pairs, could stay underwater only for about 12 minutes at a time, said Luca Cari, the spokesman for the corps.

Divers were seeking a safe point of access to the cabins. In a statement, the firefighters said it was impossible to verify whether there were people inside the hull.

“Obviously everything fell and the space is very tight,” Mr. Cari said, adding that the divers were having to remove obstacles, like furnishings and electrical wiring, that were “completely blocking passages.”

Mr. Cari said that several of the divers had been present during the search and rescue operations on the Costa Concordia, a cruise liner that capsized just off the Tuscan island of Giglio in 2012, killing 32 people in what is considered one of the worst maritime disasters in modern Italian history.

“It’s like the Costa Concordia, but much smaller,” Mr. Cari said in a telephone interview, comparing the search operations. “In the Costa Concordia we came across many obstacles but we somehow were able to overcome them — here the obstacles block the passages and have to be removed.”

“This makes it more difficult,” he said.

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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Captain who rescued yacht survivors recalls 'a big disaster'

STORY: :: The captain of a rescue boat recalls the moment a luxury yacht capsized off Sicily

:: Karsten Borner, Captain who rescued survivors from sinking sailboat

"This morning we got this strong hurricane gust and we had to start the engine to keep the ship in an angled position, and we watched the ship behind us not to touch them and we managed to keep the ship in position, and after the storm was over, we noticed that the ship behind us was gone."

:: Palermo, Italy

BORNER: "And then we saw a red flare, so my first mate and I went to the position, and we found this life raft drifting."

JOURNALIST: " But anything inside?"

BORNER: "There were fifteen people inside."

:: August 19, 2024

BORNER: "Yes. And in the life raft, there was also a little baby and the wife of the (ship) owner. The owner and her child are still inside, I guess. So, of course, a big disaster here."

Search and rescue operations were underway after one man died and six people were missing after a 184-ft (56-meter-long) sailboat, which was British registered, sank with 22 people on board shortly before sunrise, the coast guard said in a statement.

Local media reported that all those rescued on the life raft were in a stable condition.

The coast guard said the boat had been found at a depth of around 160 feet (49 meters) and that divers were inspecting the wreck.

Prosecutors in the nearby town of Termini Imerese have opened an investigation to look into what had gone wrong.

The coastguard named the yacht as the Bayesian, built by Italian shipbuilder Perini in 2008.

A U.K. foreign ministry spokesperson said British officials were in contact with local authorities over the incident and were ready to provide consular support for Britons who were affected.

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