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Questions for Investigators Trying to Unravel Mystery of Luxury Yacht’s Sinking

The investigators searching for answers about the shipwreck, leaving seven dead, face questions about extreme weather and possible human error or problems with the yacht itself.

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By Alan Yuhas

More than 180 feet long, with a mast towering about 240 feet and a keel that could be lowered for greater stability, the Bayesian luxury yacht did not, in the eyes of its maker, have the vulnerabilities of a ship that would easily sink.

“It drives me insane,” Giovanni Costantino, the chief executive of the Italian Sea Group, which in 2022 bought the company that made the ship, said after its wreck last week. “Following all the proper procedures, that boat is unsinkable.”

But the $40 million sailing yacht sank within minutes and with fatal results: seven dead, including the British technology billionaire Michael Lynch, his teenage daughter, four of Mr. Lynch’s friends and a member of the crew. Fifteen people, including the captain, escaped on a lifeboat.

Mr. Lynch had invited family, friends and part of his legal team on a cruise in the Mediterranean to celebrate his acquittal in June of fraud charges tied to the sale of his company to the tech giant Hewlett-Packard.

The Italian authorities have opened a manslaughter investigation, searching for answers from the survivors, the manufacturer and the wreck itself. They face a range of questions and possible factors.

An ‘earthquake’ in the sky?

When the Bayesian sank around 4 a.m. on Aug. 19, the waters in its area, about half a mile off the Sicilian port of Porticello, were transformed by an extremely sudden and violent storm, according to fishermen, a captain in the area and meteorologists.

But what kind of storm is still a mystery, compounded by the fact that a sailing schooner anchored nearby did not have its own disaster. Also unclear is whether the crew was aware that the Italian authorities had issued general warnings about bad weather the night before.

Karsten Börner, the captain of the nearby passenger ship, said he’d had to steady his ship during “really violent” winds . During the storm, he said, the Bayesian seemed to disappear behind his ship.

Severe lightning and strong gusts were registered by the Italian Air Force’s Center for Aerospace Meteorology and Climatology, according to Attilio Di Diodato, its director. “It was very intense and brief in duration,” he said.

The yacht, he said, had most likely been hit by a fierce downburst — a blast of powerful wind surging down during a thunderstorm. His agency put out rough-sea warnings the previous evening, alerting sailors about possible storms.

Locals have said the winds “felt like an earthquake.” A fisherman in Porticello said that he had seen a flare go off in the early-morning hours. His brother ventured to the site once the weather had calmed about 20 minutes later, he said, finding only floating cushions.

The Italian authorities have so far declined to say whether investigators had seen any structural damage to the hull or other parts of the ship.

Open hatches or doors?

The boat executive, Mr. Costantino, has argued that the Bayesian was an extremely safe vessel that could list even to 75 degrees without capsizing. His company, the Italian Sea Group, in 2022 bought the yacht’s manufacturer, Perini Navi, which launched the ship in 2008.

Mr. Costantino said that if some of the hatches on the side and in the stern, or some of the deck doors, had been open, the boat could have taken on water and sunk. Standard procedure in such storms, he said, would be to switch on the engine, lift the anchor and turn the boat into the wind, lowering the keel for extra stability, closing doors and gathering the guests in the main hall inside the deck.

At a news conference on Saturday, almost a week after the sinking, investigators said the yacht had sunk at an angle , with its stern — where the heavy engine was — having gone down first. The wreck was found lying on its right side at the bottom of a bay, about 165 feet deep.

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

Water pouring into open hatches or doors could have contributed to the sinking, experts say, but that on its own may not account for the speed at which such a large boat vanished underwater.

Asked about the hatches at the news conference, the authorities declined to comment on whether they had been found open at the wreck.

The authorities have also not specified whether the boat had been anchored, whether it was under power at the time or whether its sails had been unfurled.

A retracted keel?

The Bayesian had a keel — the fin-like structure beneath a boat that can help stabilize it — that could be retracted or extended, according to its manufacturer. On some yachts, keels can be raised to let the large vessel dock in shallower water, and extended downward to help keep a boat level.

But like the hatches, the status of the keel alone may not explain why a large ship sank with such precipitous speed. Investigators have not disclosed what divers may have seen at the wreck, aside from saying divers had faced obstacles like furnishings and electrical wiring in tight quarters. Officials want to raise the wreck to better examine it, a process that may take weeks.

Human error?

Ambrogio Cartosio, the prosecutor in charge of the case, said at the news conference that it was “plausible” crimes had been committed, but that investigators had not zeroed in on any potential suspects.

“There could be responsibilities of the captain only,” he said. “There could be responsibilities of the whole crew. There could be responsibilities of the boat makers. Or there could be responsibilities of those who were in charge of surveilling the boat.”

It remains unclear what kind of emergency training or preparation took place before the disaster, or what kind of coordination there was during it. So far, none of the surviving crew members have made a public statement about what happened the night the ship sank.

Prosecutors said they want to ask more questions of the captain and crew, who have been in a Sicilian hotel with other survivors. They said that neither alcohol nor drug tests had been performed on crew members, and that they have been allowed to leave Italy.

Prosecutors also said they were also investigating why the captain, an experienced sailor, left the sinking boat while some passengers were still on board.

Besides possible manslaughter charges, the authorities are investigating the possibility of a negligently caused shipwreck.

The bodies of five passengers were found in one cabin, on the left side of the yacht, the authorities said. The five were most likely trying to flee to the higher side of the boat and were probably sleeping when the boat started to sink, they said.

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Blackbox sheds light on tragic final minutes of billionaire’s superyacht trip

Mike lynch had gathered his nearest and dearest to toast walking away a free man from a hp fraud trial, article bookmarked.

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It was supposed to be a summer celebration.

British tech tycoon Mike Lynch had gathered his tried and trusted lawyers who had been with him every step of the way helping him emerge unscathed from a gruelling 13-year legal battle. Twelve guests had flown into the picturesque Italian port of Porticello, near Palermo from the UK, the US,  Canada , New Zealand and Ireland, to mark the end of the fraud trial that had consumed much of their lives.

But now a manslaughter investigation  has been launched as Mr Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah were among the seven people who died after the vessel capsized during bad weather in the early hours of Monday morning.

Morgan Stanley chairman Jonathan Bloomer, his wife Judith Bloomer, Clifford Chance lawyer Christopher Morvillo and his wife Neda Morvillo also died.

Italian public prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio, from nearby town Termini Imerese said his office has opened an initial investigation into manslaughter and negligent  shipwreck .

The group had been welcomed on board the six luxurious suites of Bayesian, a 56-metre-long £30 million superyacht , by the ten crew. Boasting the tallest aluminium mast in the world - higher than Nelson’s Column - experts now speculate it may have caused her to topple and become pinned underwater in an unpredictable, ferocious storm.

The ship was named after the statistical method, the Bayesian inference, an 18th-century theory that helps forecasters predict outcomes more reliably. Mr Lynch based his entire PHD thesis around it, later amassing his huge fortune after selling his company Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard for $11 billion in 2011.

He had improbably beaten the odds in a bitter US legal dispute with the technology giant, convincing a jury that he was not guilty of claims of massive fraud after a long legal fight that finally came to an end in June. Two months ago he emerged from court with tears in his eyes a free man he pledged to restructure extradition laws that brought him to the US in cuffs.

Disaster struck at around 5am when a freak tornado over the sea known as a waterspout rocked the superyacht, according to Sicily ’s civil protection agency. The crew fired off disaster flares causing local fishermen and others to navigate the storm to come to the aid of survivors.

The captain of a nearby boat said that when the winds surged, he had turned on the engine to keep control of his vessel and avoid a collision with the Bayesian, which had been anchored alongside him.

“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 said.

The other boat “went flat on the water, and then down,” he added. He said his crew then found some of the survivors on a life raft and took them on board before the coast guard picked them up.

This included a one-year-old girl named Sophie one of the 16 survivors, so far.

Her mother, Charlotte Golunski, 36, told how she battled to keep her child above the dark and raging Mediterranean while calling for help amid the awful piercing screams of other struggling guests and crew.

“For two seconds I lost the baby in the sea, then I immediately held her again in the fury of the waves,” she told Giornale di Sicilia. “I held her tightly, tightly to me, while the sea was raging. So many were screaming. Fortunately, the lifeboat inflated and 11 of us managed to get on it.”

This left six passengers unaccounted for - Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter, Morgan Stanley International non-executive chairman Jonathan Bloomer, Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo, and their wives Judy and Neda.

The worn-out Captain of the yacht , James Catfield said simply: “We didn’t see it coming.”

“The wind was very strong. Bad weather was expected, but not of this magnitude,” a coast guard official in the Sicilian capital Palermo said the next day.

Local fisherman Giuseppe Cefalu told how he saw a “tornado” close to the port on Monday morning. Mr Cefalu said he and his brother Fabio saw a flare in the sky at around 5am.

The pair aided efforts to locate people in the water after the yacht vanished beneath the waves, but Mr Cefalu said he only saw cushions and a buoy.

He said weather conditions on the morning of the sinking were “fierce”, with “very strong” wind and rain.

The luxury superyacht is “practically intact” on the seabed despite sinking, Marco Tilotta, a firefighter diver from Palermo, has told Italian newspaper Il Messaggero.

He said in an interview that the multi-million yacht was lying on its side at a depth of 48 metres, but that divers were unable to gain access because of floating furnishings and other debris inside the yacht.

“The fear is that the bodies got trapped inside the vessel,” which was lying 49 metres deep, Salvatore Cocina, head of civil protection in Sicily , added.

“The biggest difficulty we have is due to the depth, which does not allow long times of intervention,” fire department diver Marco Tilotta told reporters. “We plan ... to search centimetre by centimetre.”

Now they enter a critical 24 hours according to Nick Sloane, a lead diver in the Costa Concordia wreck. He told Sky News that survivors might be trapped in air pockets inside the ship, but that time is running out fast to rescue them.

“They’ve got a very small window of time to try to find people stuck inside with hopefully an air pocket, and they could be rescued.

“If the yacht is on its side, it might have more air pockets than if it’s upright. She’s got quite a large keel, and that will deflect and put her on her side, I’m sure.”

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Billionaire son of Irish parents and his daughter confirmed dead in Italy yacht tragedy

Mike lynch, who previously spoke warmly of his childhood summers in ireland, is among the seven victims of the bayesian yacht tragedy in italy..

Mike Lynch, the billionaire son of Irish parents, and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah Lynch are among the people confirmed to have died during the Bayesian yacht shipwreck in Italy on Monday, August 19 .

Mike's body was recovered on Thursday while his daughter's was recovered on Friday. They are among the seven casualties of what is being deemed a 'freak accident' that occurred at the port of Porticello in Sicily, Italy early on Monday.

"The Lynch family is devastated, in shock, and is being comforted and supported by family and friends," a spokesperson for the family said on Friday, August 23.

"Their thoughts are with everyone affected by the tragedy.

"They would like to sincerely thank the Italian coastguard, emergency services and all those who helped in the rescue.

"Their one request now is that their privacy be respected at this time of unspeakable grief."

Separately, Hannah's sister Esme said in a heartbreaking statement: "Hannah often burst into my bedroom and lay down with me.

"Sometimes beaming with a smile, sometimes cheeky, sometimes for advice. No matter what, she brought boundless love to me. 

"She was endlessly caring, passionately mad, unintentionally hilarious and the most amazing, supportive and joyful sister and best friend to me. 

"And on top of all this, she had even more love to give endlessly to all her friends and passion to give to her incredible studies and goals. 

"She is my little angel, my star."

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Mike Lynch, sometimes referred to as the 'British Bill Gates,' was born to Irish parents - his mother, a nurse, was from Co Tipperary, and his father, a firefighter, was from Co Cork.

In an RTÉ Radio interview in 2015, Mike said: "I had lots of extended family in Carrick and I have very, very fond memories of holidays spent in Tipperary.

"It's a beautiful part of Ireland, down there. You've got the River Suir going through the town and you can imagine when you're a young boy going out there and being taken fishing and all sorts of things by the uncles, just wonderful."

In the same interview, Mike confirmed that he was born in Ilford in London, despite reports claiming that he was born in Ireland. He attributed the confusion to an error on his Wikipedia page.

Mike, who graduated from Cambridge, went on to say that his parents liked to encourage him, but that they also didn't let him get "too much of a big head."

• Irish national reportedly among survivors of tragic superyacht shipwreck in Italy

In 2011, Mike made an estimated $800 million when Hewlett-Packard bought Autonomy, the tech company he founded in 1996, for about $11 billion. The following year, however, Hewlett-Packard claimed Autonomy's value had been massively inflated and announced a writedown of $8.8 billion.

Mike denied the allegations.

The UK Serious Fraud Office investigated the allegations but announced in 2015 that it was ending its investigation with no action due to insufficient evidence.

In November 2018, Mike was indicted for fraud in the US along with Stephen Chamberlain, former vice president of finance at Autonomy. Mike submitted himself for arrest in February 2020 and was released on $10 million bail. Mike was extradited to the US - after his appeal against it was rejected - in January 2022.

Meanwhile, Hewlett-Packard launched civil action against Mike and Sushovan Hussain, Autonomy's CFO, in London's High Court in 2019, accusing them of artificially inflating "Autonomy’s reported revenues, revenue growth, and gross margins." Following a nine-month trial, the court ruled in Hewlett-Packard's favor. The judge said the amount of damages to be paid would be dealt with at a later date. The Associated Press reported this week that the US company was seeking $4 billion. 

Mike and Stephen's US trial began in March of this year and concluded in June. Both were found not guilty on all charges.

Stephen was fatally struck by a car in England on August 17, just days before Mike's tragic passing.

Salvo Cocina of Sicily’s civil protection agency told the Associated Press on Monday that a tornado over the water known as a waterspout struck the area overnight.

“They were in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Cocina said

22 people - 10 passengers and 12 crewmembers - were on board. Mike was reportedly celebrating his recent acquittal with the people who had defended him at trial.

As well as Mike and his daughter Hannah, Christopher Morvillo, one of Lynch’s US lawyers, and his wife, Neda; Jonathan Bloomer, chairman of Morgan Stanley’s London-based investment banking subsidiary, and his wife, Judy; and Recaldo Thomas, the yacht’s chef, all perished.

Angela Bercales, Mike's wife and Hannah's mother, is among the 15 survivors of the tragedy. Early reports said an Irish national was also among the survivors. 

As is typical, an investigation into the sinking of the yacht has been launched and is continuing. 

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Macabre Twist in Shock Sinking of Missing Tech Billionaire’s Yacht

Mike Lynch is feared dead after his yacht sunk off the Italian coast—just days after his former VP was fatally struck by a car.

Josh Fiallo

Breaking News Reporter

Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast/X/Reuters

Mysterious circumstances that preceded the sinking of billionaire Mike Lynch ’s yacht on Monday morning have left the internet abuzz with conspiracies.

That’s because Lynch’s ex-colleague and c0-defendant in a recently-closed U.S. fraud trial was fatally struck by a car on Saturday—two days before authorities say a tornado abruptly sunk Lynch’s yacht off the coast of Sicily. Both men were acquitted following the trial.

Stephen Chamberlain, the financial vice president of Autonomy during Lynch’s reign as CEO, was critically injured by a car that crashed into him as he was out for a jog on Saturday. He was placed on life support but succumbed to his injuries on Monday, his attorney Gary Lincenberg confirmed.

Police in Cambridgeshire said a blue Vauxhall Corsa struck a man in his 50s, now known to be Chamberlain, ultimately killing him. Officers said the unnamed woman who struck him, aged 49, remained at the crash site.

“He was a courageous man with unparalleled integrity,” said Lincenberg of Chamberlain. “We deeply miss him. Steve fought successfully to clear his good name at trial earlier this year, and his good name now lives on through his wonderful family.”

Chamberlain stood trial alongside Lynch, 59, as they were charged with fraud in connection with the $11 billion sale of Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard in 2011—a case that ended with a San Francisco jury acquitting the men in June.

They faced more than 20 years in federal lock up had they been convicted.

Aboard Lynch’s ill-fated trip in his 184-foot sailing vessel Bayesian were the attorneys who’d led his defense against U.S. prosecutors. He’s now feared to be dead, along with five others who remained missing on Monday night.

Divers were dispatched to the sinking site of the Bayesian. Six people, including two Americans, remained unaccounted for by Monday night.

Reuters via handout

That tally includes Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter, Hannah, as well as one of his attorneys. Two Americans are also reportedly among the missing and another British national. Italian authorities said they’re still searching for those unaccounted for and that dive teams have been dispatched. The body of a Canadian chef has already been recovered from the vessel.

A lawyer aboard the Bayesian’s ill fated trip was the 36-year-old Ayla Ronald, the The Telegraph reported. Her father, Lin Ronald, said the trip was to celebrate Lynch’s acquittal.

Among the survivors of Monday’s tragedy was Lynch’s wife, Angela Bacares. She told La Repubblica that she sustained abrasions to her feet during the chaos and is now unable to walk.

Witnesses of the Mediterranean storm told Italian news agency ANSA that the ship was anchored in front of the port of Porticello when a tornadic waterspout formed and struck the Bayesian. The vessel sank shortly after.

“I was at home when the tornado hit,” Pietro Asciutto, a local fisherman, told ANSA. “I immediately closed all the windows. Then I saw the boat, it had only one mast, it was very large. I saw it sink suddenly.”

The Bayesian, a 56-meter-long sailboat, was photographed (left) off the coast of Palermo just hours before sinking.

Baia Santa Nicolicchia/Fabio La Bianca

Fabio Cefalù, a trawler captain who was nearby, told the BBC that he went to where the Bayesian sunk not long after the waterspout passed. Within 10 minutes, all that remained of the vessel was a series of floating items from its deck. He said he saw no survivors in the water.

Loved ones of Lynch largely haven’t spoken out since his disappearance, possibly in hopes that he may miraculously reappear. Some reports have described the tech billionaire, who didn’t maintain a public social media presence, as admiring James Bond, building model railways, and breeding koi carp. He had a second daughter, aged 21, and six dogs, reported The Daily Mail .

“At the companies he ran, Lynch is said to have put his own personal stamp, indulging his penchant for James Bond,” reported The Guardian on Monday. “Conference rooms were reportedly named after Bond enemies, such as Dr No and Goldfinger, and Autonomy even had a piranha tank in the atrium, in a nod to the 007 caper You Only Live Twice.”

Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast  here .

READ THIS LIST

Tragedy at sea: Yacht sinks, claiming billionaire's family

T he body of Hannah Lynch, daughter of a British billionaire, was found in the cabin of the sunken yacht Bayesiana. Five other bodies, including her father’s, were discovered in a separate part of the luxury boat. Investigators are determining what caused the yacht's sinking, which was considered "unsinkable."

At the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea, 165 feet below the surface, the body of 18-year-old Hannah Lynch , the daughter of well-known tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch, was found.

The tragedy occurred after the sinking of the yacht Bayresian , on which the teenager was traveling with her father and others. Fire Chief Bentivoglio Fiandra reported at a press conference that in addition to Hannah, five other people lost their lives, who were found in a separate part of the yacht .

Prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio, leading the preliminary investigation, does not rule out that the cause of the tragedy could be involuntary manslaughter , but emphasized that it is still too early to draw final conclusions.

The yacht’s captain, James Cutfield, has already been questioned by investigators . During the storm, the yacht capsized onto one side. The fire department revealed that people tried to seek shelter in the part of the vessel facing the surface.

The Lynch family, in mourning, issued a statement , expressing their gratitude to the Italian coast guard and all services involved in the search operation.

Hannah’s sister, Esme, shared personal memories, describing her as a loving, caring, and passionate person . In her words, she paints a picture of Hannah as an amazing sister and friend.

Tragedy in the Mediterranean Sea: a luxury yacht sank

During the search operation, which involved 27 divers, the bodies of all the missing were found . The tragedy impacted not only the Lynch family but also other significant passengers, including the chairman of Morgan Stanley International, Jonathan Bloomer, and his wife, Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo, and his spouse.

The sinking of the yacht Bayresian has become the subject of international interest, especially since it occurred during a trip celebrating Mike Lynch’s acquittal in a fraud case in the United States .

The development of events in this case will be closely monitored, with the main task of investigators being to determine what led to the sinking of the yacht considered "unsinkable" by the manufacturer .

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Yacht sinks: Missing tech billionaire's co-defendant died in car crash days before Italy disaster

Stephen chamberlain, 52, was vice president of finance at mike lynch's autonomy corp..

Moment luxury yacht sinks off coast of Italy caught on camera, with 6 presumed dead

Grainy CCTV footage shows the moment a storm struck the Bayesian luxury yacht, which sank Aug. 19, 2024, off the coast of Italy. Six people are missing, officials say. (Giornale di Sicilia)

A co-defendant of British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch was killed in England after being struck by a car just days before Lynch and five others went missing when a luxury superyacht sank off the coast of Italy on Monday, authorities confirmed Tuesday.

Divers brought three bodies in bags ashore from the yacht Wednesday, and two other bodies were found in the wreckage, The Associated Press reports, citing an Italian official. It was unclear whose bodies were found.

Stephen Chamberlain, 52, was a former Autonomy Corp. executive who was acquitted alongside Lynch in June of charges in a multibillion-dollar fraud case related to Hewlett Packard’s $11 billion takeover of Lynch’s company.

A body was recovered from the sunken yacht off the coast of Porticello, near the Sicilian city of Palermo, Italy, Aug. 21, 2024. The body's identification has not been announced. (REUTERS/Louiza Vradi)

Divers brought a second body bag ashore Wednesday. (REUTERS/Louiza Vradi)

Chamberlain "was fatally struck by a car on Saturday while out running" in Cambridgeshire, his lawyer Gary Lincenberg said in a statement.

"He was a courageous man with unparalleled integrity. We deeply miss him," Lincenberg said. "Steve fought successfully to clear his good name at trial earlier this year, and his good name now lives on through his wonderful family."

MOMENT LUXURY YACHT SINKS OFF COAST OF ITALY CAUGHT ON CAMERA, WITH 6 PRESUMED DEAD

Stephen Chamberlain was confirmed to have been killed when a car struck him while he was running on Saturday. (Stephen Chamberlain via Reuters)

Chamberlain, formerly a vice president of finance at the company, was accused of artificially inflating Autonomy’s revenues and making false and misleading statements to auditors, analysts and regulators.

Chamberlain’s family released a statement through Cambridgeshire Police, saying he "was a much-loved husband, father, son, brother and friend."

"He was an amazing individual whose only goal in life was to help others in any way possible," the statement said.

Chamberlain was acquitted of fraud charges along with British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch, pictured above. (Reuters/Henry Nicholls/File Photo)

Police said the driver, a 49-year-old woman, remained at the scene in the village of Stretham, England, and was assisting with the investigation.

WHO IS MIKE LYNCH, THE BRITISH TECH ENTREPRENEUR MISSING AFTER YACHT SANK?

The strange coincidence of Chamberlain’s death occurred just days before Lynch and five others, including Christopher Morvillo, one of Lynch’s lawyers who defended him in the fraud case, and Morgan Stanley International chairman Jonathan Bloomer, who testified in Lynch’s defense, went missing when the Bayesian superyacht sank off the coast of Sicily early Monday.

The other three people still missing are believed to be Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter Hannah, Bloomer’s wife Neda, and Morvillo’s wife Judy.

Recaldo Thomas, a chef who died in the yacht disaster off Sicily's coast, poses for a selfie in this picture obtained from social media. (Recaldo Thomas/via Reuters)

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Ten crew members and 12 passengers, including British, American and Canadian nationals were onboard when the vessel capsized. One man's body was recovered, identified as onboard chef Recaldo Thomas, an Antiguan citizen. Fifteen people were rescued, including a 1-year-old girl, authorities said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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How did the yacht of missing tech billionaire sink various theories float on social media.

Mike Lynch's yacht unexpectedly sank off the coast of Sicily due to a tornado. The missing tally includes billionaire Mike Lynch, his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah, as well as one of his attorneys.

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Blackbox sheds light on tragic final minutes of billionaire’s superyacht trip

It was supposed to be a summer celebration.

British tech tycoon Mike Lynch had gathered his tried and trusted lawyers who had been with him every step of the way helping him emerge unscathed from a gruelling 13-year legal battle. Twelve guests had flown into the picturesque Italian port of Porticello, near Palermo from the UK, the US,  Canada , New Zealand and Ireland, to mark the end of the fraud trial that had consumed much of their lives.

But now a manslaughter investigation  has been launched as Mr Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah were among the seven people who died after the vessel capsized during bad weather in the early hours of Monday morning.

Morgan Stanley chairman Jonathan Bloomer, his wife Judith Bloomer, Clifford Chance lawyer Christopher Morvillo and his wife Neda Morvillo also died.

Italian public prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio, from nearby town Termini Imerese said his office has opened an initial investigation into manslaughter and negligent  shipwreck .

The group had been welcomed on board the six luxurious suites of Bayesian, a 56-metre-long £30 million superyacht , by the ten crew. Boasting the tallest aluminium mast in the world - higher than Nelson’s Column - experts now speculate it may have caused her to topple and become pinned underwater in an unpredictable, ferocious storm.

The ship was named after the statistical method, the Bayesian inference, an 18th-century theory that helps forecasters predict outcomes more reliably. Mr Lynch based his entire PHD thesis around it, later amassing his huge fortune after selling his company Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard for $11 billion in 2011.

He had improbably beaten the odds in a bitter US legal dispute with the technology giant, convincing a jury that he was not guilty of claims of massive fraud after a long legal fight that finally came to an end in June. Two months ago he emerged from court with tears in his eyes a free man he pledged to restructure extradition laws that brought him to the US in cuffs.

Disaster struck at around 5am when a freak tornado over the sea known as a waterspout rocked the superyacht, according to Sicily ’s civil protection agency. The crew fired off disaster flares causing local fishermen and others to navigate the storm to come to the aid of survivors.

The captain of a nearby boat said that when the winds surged, he had turned on the engine to keep control of his vessel and avoid a collision with the Bayesian, which had been anchored alongside him.

“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 said.

The other boat “went flat on the water, and then down,” he added. He said his crew then found some of the survivors on a life raft and took them on board before the coast guard picked them up.

This included a one-year-old girl named Sophie one of the 16 survivors, so far.

Her mother, Charlotte Golunski, 36, told how she battled to keep her child above the dark and raging Mediterranean while calling for help amid the awful piercing screams of other struggling guests and crew.

“For two seconds I lost the baby in the sea, then I immediately held her again in the fury of the waves,” she told Giornale di Sicilia. “I held her tightly, tightly to me, while the sea was raging. So many were screaming. Fortunately, the lifeboat inflated and 11 of us managed to get on it.”

This left six passengers unaccounted for - Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter, Morgan Stanley International non-executive chairman Jonathan Bloomer, Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo, and their wives Judy and Neda.

The worn-out Captain of the yacht , James Catfield said simply: “We didn’t see it coming.”

“The wind was very strong. Bad weather was expected, but not of this magnitude,” a coast guard official in the Sicilian capital Palermo said the next day.

Local fisherman Giuseppe Cefalu told how he saw a “tornado” close to the port on Monday morning. Mr Cefalu said he and his brother Fabio saw a flare in the sky at around 5am.

The pair aided efforts to locate people in the water after the yacht vanished beneath the waves, but Mr Cefalu said he only saw cushions and a buoy.

He said weather conditions on the morning of the sinking were “fierce”, with “very strong” wind and rain.

The luxury superyacht is “practically intact” on the seabed despite sinking, Marco Tilotta, a firefighter diver from Palermo, has told Italian newspaper Il Messaggero.

He said in an interview that the multi-million yacht was lying on its side at a depth of 48 metres, but that divers were unable to gain access because of floating furnishings and other debris inside the yacht.

“The fear is that the bodies got trapped inside the vessel,” which was lying 49 metres deep, Salvatore Cocina, head of civil protection in Sicily , added.

“The biggest difficulty we have is due to the depth, which does not allow long times of intervention,” fire department diver Marco Tilotta told reporters. “We plan ... to search centimetre by centimetre.”

Now they enter a critical 24 hours according to Nick Sloane, a lead diver in the Costa Concordia wreck. He told Sky News that survivors might be trapped in air pockets inside the ship, but that time is running out fast to rescue them.

“They’ve got a very small window of time to try to find people stuck inside with hopefully an air pocket, and they could be rescued.

“If the yacht is on its side, it might have more air pockets than if it’s upright. She’s got quite a large keel, and that will deflect and put her on her side, I’m sure.”

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Billionaire Larry Ellison, among world’s richest people, has bought a Florida resort

Ellison is said to have paid millions for the oceanfront resort. the oracle software mogul also bought the biggest residential estate in manalapan and owns most of a hawaiian island, his primary home..

Billionaire Larry Ellison, who in April 2024 was ranked by Forbes as the world’s fifth richest person, a few months later paid at least $277.34 million for the Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa in Manalapan, the wealthy Florida town south of Palm Beach , according to the deed recorded Aug. 13 and statement released by the resort.

The price Ellison paid for the oceanfront hotel was undisclosed when the resort announced the sale on Aug. 8.

Ellison, who co-founded software mammoth Oracle, was already familiar with Manalapan. In June 2022, he dropped $173 million of his fortune to buy an ocean-to-lake compound in the same town. That transaction was the largest residential sale ever in Florida. 

So who is Larry Ellison? Here’s a quick look at the billionaire.

How rich is Larry Ellison?

On Aug. 8, 2024, the day the Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa announced the sale to Ellison, Forbes estimated the 79-year-old’s net worth at $159.7 billion.  The next day, Forbes' real-time ranking increased his wealth to $162.9 billion.

How did Larry Ellison get his fortune?

Ellison co-founded Oracle Corp. with two partners in Santa Clara, California, in 1977. Today, the software powerhouse bills itself as the world’s largest database-management company. Ellison spent 37 years as CEO and still holds the titles of chairman and chief technology officer at the company. His ownership stake in the company is reportedly 42 percent.

In April 2024, Ellison announced he was moving Oracle’s headquarters from Austin, Texas, to Nashville, Tennessee.

In a June 2024 earnings call, one of Ellison's focuses was Oracle’s construction of data centers to accommodate the increasing demand for generative artificial intelligence. “We are literally building the smallest, most portable, most affordable cloud data centers all the way up to 200-megawatt data centers, ideal for training very large language models and keeping them up-to-date,” Ellison said during the call.

What about Larry Ellison’s Tesla ties?

Among Ellison’s most well-publicized stock purchases, he invested heavily in his billionaire friend Elon Musk’s Tesla and joined the company’s board in 2018. Ellison stepped off the board in August 2022 but still owns about 15 million shares in the electric carmaker, according to Forbes.

Did Larry Ellison go to college?

Yes, but he didn’t graduate. He dropped out of the University of Chicago and the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, according to Bloomberg and other published reports.

Where’s Larry Ellison from and where does he live? 

A native New Yorker from The Bronx, Ellison has lived in the Chicago area and California. But he has said his primary home is on the island of Lanai in Hawaii . He reportedly paid $300 million for almost all of that island 10 years ago. He has also bought homes in Newport, Rhode Island; and California. He has been divorced four times.

What about Larry Ellison’s property in Palm Beach County, Florida? 

Ellison's ownership entity bought his Manalapan estate — and part of nearby Bird Island in the Intracoastal Waterway — in June 2022 from a trust controlled by a fellow software billionaire, Jim Clark. In all, the estate and its island measure more than 22 acres. 

The property straddles both sides of South Ocean Boulevard, with a tunnel beneath the roadway connecting the larger oceanfront parcel with the one that fronts the Intracoastal Waterway.

The residential purchase in Manalapan followed another one in Palm Beach County. In April 2021, a company linked to Ellison is paid a recorded $80 million for an oceanfront estate on 6½ acres in the Seminole Landing community  near North Palm Beach. That estate is about 27 miles away from the property Manalapan estate.

What are Larry Ellison’s plans for the resort hotel he bought in Florida?

Ellison plans to make improvements to the Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa, according to the August 2024 statement announcing his purchase . But the statement did not provide any specifics.

One of several hospitality properties in Ellison's real estate portfolio, the 8-acre Palm resort and hotel at 100 S. Ocean Blvd. features seaside swimming pools, a 42,000-square-foot spa, 32,000 square feet of meeting space and several restaurants. Eau Palm Beach has consistently earned high ratings from travel magazines and hospitality organizations.

Ellison bought the Mediterranean-style, 300-plus room resort from the London-based Lewis Trust Group, which had owned the property since 2003. When the Lewis family bought the resort, it was a Ritz Carlton branded property but that relationship ended in 2013.

In addition to co-founding Oracle, Ellison has been involved in a variety of luxury hospitality ventures. His portfolio includes the Four Seasons Resort Lanai, Sensei Lanai, Nobu Ryokan Malibu, Nobu Hotel Palo Alto, the Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe, and Sensei Porcupine Creek. 

More: Billionaire Larry Ellison buys Florida resort. Here's a look at his other hotels

What about Larry Ellison’s politics?

On May 20, 2022, The Washington Post and other outlets reported that Ellison, who has supported conservative Republican causes, took part in a call on Nov. 14, 2020, with Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and others “that focused on strategies for contesting the legitimacy of the vote” in the Nov. 3, 2020, presidential elections won by President Joe Biden against former President Donald Trump. The Post cited court documents and “a participant” as sources. The call, the Post reported, is “the first known example of a technology industry titan joining powerful figures in conservative politics, media and law to strategize about Trump’s post-loss options.” Others on the call included Fox News host Sean Hannity, Trump attorney Jay Sekulow and attorney James Bopp Jr., who represented True the Vote, a nonprofit group that that has “promoted disputed claims of widespread voter fraud,” according to the Post. Ellison and Oracle did not respond to the Post for a request for comment, the Post reported at the time.

But as of mid-April 2024, Ellison had not made single donation to Trump's 2024 campaign, CNBC reported.

What does Larry Ellison like to do in his spare time?

He races sailboats, flies planes, and plays tennis and guitar, according to a brief biographical sketch on the Oracle website. He also has owned number of yachts, including Musashi, a 2011 Feadship superyacht measuring 288 feet in length and accommodating 18 passengers. 

What are Larry Ellison's charitable efforts?

Among his philanthropic initiatives, he gave $200 million to fund cancer-treatment research at the University of Southern California in 2016. The Lawrence J. Ellison Institute for Transformative Medicine in Los Angles is named for him.

This story was updated from a previous version.

Darrell Hofheinz is a USA TODAY Network of Florida journalist who writes about Palm Beach real estate in his weekly “Beyond the Hedges” column. He welcomes tips about real estate news on the island. Email [email protected], call 561-820-3831 or tweet @PBDN_Hofheinz. Subscribe today to support our journalism.