The superyacht Bayesian
the night before it sank
At 237 feet tall, the mast was
one of the tallest in the world.
At 237 feet tall,
the mast was one of the tallest in the world.
The Bayesian’s
single mast
Its sister ships
have two masts
Current Bayesian
using a single mast.
The seas were calm when the Bayesian, the $40 million superyacht of the British tech mogul Michael Lynch, dropped anchor off Sicily.
It was a celebratory voyage. But before dawn, a storm blew in.
Lightning crackled. Winds neared hurricane strength. The sky dumped a blinding torrent. The yacht drifted out of control. Then it was gone.
A New York Times investigation discovered that the Bayesian’s most striking feature — its extra-tall mast and the engineering to accommodate it — made the yacht vulnerable to capsizing.
The Bayesian was an outlier. All the other boats in the same series, from the same Italian manufacturer, had two masts instead of one.
Technical documents obtained by The Times and computer models show the yacht was susceptible to being knocked over in a storm and would sink quickly.
Fifteen survivors, bloodied and broken, made it to a life raft. But seven died as the Bayesian plunged to the bottom, where divers have searched for answers.
What Sank the Tech Tycoon’s ‘Unsinkable’ Yacht?
By Jeffrey Gettleman , James Glanz , Emma Bubola , Elisabetta Povoledo , Pablo Robles , Josh Holder and Sarah Hurtes
It all happened so fast.
Karsten Borner was planted on the halfdeck of his sailboat in the slanting rain. A grizzled mariner who had survived many storms, he was anchored in the same cove as Mr. Lynch’s yacht, at the same time, as the squall blew in during the early hours of Aug. 19.
Luckily, he was already awake. As the wind picked up, he and his crew scurried around closing hatches, clearing the decks and firing up the engines to keep his boat steady.
He couldn’t see much, but in flashes of lightning, he kept catching glimpses of Mr. Lynch’s long, sleek sloop bobbing behind him. It was only a few hundred feet away and its super-tall aluminum mast — one of the tallest ever made — was lit up with bright white lights, swaying in the wind.
Then he lost sight of it. The rain fell like gravel, drawing a curtain around his boat. When he looked up again, he was stunned. The Bayesian was disappearing, at a very odd angle, into the sea.
In the weeks since, Mr. Borner, who has sailed for more than half a century, still can’t believe the yacht sank in front of him. There weren’t any big waves that night, he said. Both boats were close to shore. His own sailboat — a converted tugboat built in East Germany 66 years ago — weathered the same squall just fine. And that other craft was a superyacht of the superrich, gleaming blue, 184 feet long and drawing stares wherever it went.
“It’s a mystery,” Mr. Borner said.
The seven victims of the Bayesian sinking, clockwise from top left: Hannah Lynch, Mike Lynch, Judy Bloomer, Jonathan Bloomer, Christopher Morvillo, Neda Nassiri and Recaldo Thomas.
via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images; via Reuters; Patrick McMullan, via Getty Images
That mystery has rippled around the globe as several investigations into the tragedy unfold. It has vexed maritime experts and compounded the grief of family and friends of the seven people who perished, including Mr. Lynch and his teenage daughter, Hannah, whose bodies were found trapped below deck.
The investigations turn on three central questions: Why did the Bayesian, which now lies 160 feet at the bottom of the Mediterranean, sink so fast? Did the yacht have any design flaws? Did the captain or crew make any fatal mistakes?
The Bayesian was a one-of-a-kind sailboat, built by Perini Navi, a famous Italian yacht maker. The company says the group of 10 superyachts that the Bayesian belonged to was “the most successful series of large sailing yachts ever conceived.”
But the Bayesian was different. Its original buyer — a Dutch businessman, not the Lynches — insisted on a single, striking mast that would be taller than just about any other mast in the world, according to the Italian yacht maker and three people with detailed knowledge of how this boat was built.
That decision resulted in major engineering consequences that ultimately left the boat significantly more vulnerable than many comparable superyachts, The Times investigation has found.
— More than a dozen naval architects, engineers and other experts consulted by The Times found glaring weaknesses in the Bayesian’s design that they said could have contributed to the disaster.
— Basic design choices, like the two tall doors on the side of the deck, increased the Bayesian’s chances of taking on dangerous amounts of water if high winds pushed the boat over toward its side, several naval architects said.
— Witness and survivor accounts revealed how this deadly sequence unfolded in real time: The yacht fell completely on its side and sank within minutes.
The Bayesian’s vulnerabilities
How the Bayesian could have sunk
The large aluminum mast and rigging made the boat more likely to capsize in a strong gust of wind, a computer model shows.
The Bayesian was pushed onto its side in strong winds.
STRONG GUST
At this angle, experts say water would have gushed in through open vents, doors and hatches.
Two tall glass doors could have let water in if they were left open.
A sunken deck reduced the boat’s buoyancy, naval architects said.
It had many air vents that could let water in when the boat was pushed toward its side.
As flooding worsened, the yacht would have tilted further before sinking.
The retractable keel, which helped to keep the boat stable, was not fully extended when it sank.
Sources: Perini Navi (technical drawing of the yacht) and New York Times reporting.
Seemingly small details on any boat — like how close air vents are to the waterline, or where a ship’s ballast is placed in the hull — might not sound decisive on their own. But when taken together, experts said, they appear to have compromised this vessel.
Such built-in vulnerabilities may not have been solely responsible for the yacht’s sinking, of course. The storm’s unexpected ferocity definitely played a part in the calamitous stew of events. Italian investigators are also looking hard at the actions of the Bayesian’s captain and crew.
Giovanni Costantino, the chief executive of the Italian Sea Group, the company that owns Perini Navi, said that when operated properly, the Bayesian was “unsinkable.” He maintains that the yacht was carefully engineered to survive bad storms, and he has put the blame for the tragedy squarely on the crew, accusing them of making a chain of fatal errors.
“I know, all the crew knows, that they did not do what they should have done,” he said. (Crew members have not revealed much, saying they are under a “gag order.”)
Mr. Costantino said the design was not at fault and that the towering mast, which stood 237 feet tall, had not created “any kind of problem.”
“The ship was an unsinkable ship,” he said. “I say it, I repeat it.”
The world of superyachts is incredibly opaque, the exclusive realm of some of the richest people on the planet, and exactly how these multimillion dollar boats are designed, approved and owned remain closely guarded secrets.
Making sure a superyacht is fit for the seas is a job left to a network of private companies and public agencies, and the Bayesian’s design was approved by the American Bureau of Shipping and the British Maritime and Coastguard Agency.
All the attention this tragedy has received could result in a closer look at yachting regulations. Several naval engineers in different countries who have gained access to the Bayesian’s documents say that as yachts have become more elaborate and subject to owners’ whims, others may be in danger as well.
The Bayesian’s technical documents show just how vulnerable it was. Even without major errors by the crew, the ship could have sunk in a storm that other boats survived, engineers say.
“We can look at it in hindsight and say they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. No, that’s not true,” said Tad Roberts, a Canadian naval architect who has nearly 40 years of experience designing boats, including superyachts.
“This boat had definite shortcomings that kind of uniquely made it vulnerable to what happened.”
The Victory Voyages
A cruise on the Bayesian was a voyage into luxury. The days were typically warm, sunny and calm, and finished off with plates of fresh langoustine and sumptuous chocolate. Hours would pass lounging on sun chairs, swimming in the sea or maybe taking out a kayak while the Bayesian crew, in branded polo shirts, watched vigilantly from the deck.
“It felt like a beautiful hotel that was floating on water,” remembers Abbie VanSickle, a New York Times reporter who was invited aboard in July because her husband, Jonathan Baum, was part of Mr. Lynch’s legal defense team.
Mr. Lynch had been acquitted in June in a criminal case in which he was accused of fraudulently inflating the value of his software company when he sold it to Hewlett-Packard for $11 billion. He could have been sent to prison for years. To celebrate his win — and his freedom — he asked friends and lawyers to cruise the Mediterranean with him.
Mr. Lynch seemed proud that his boat had one of the world’s tallest masts — a little booklet in her cabin even said as much, Ms. VanSickle remembered. Whenever they chugged into a harbor, she said, “people would take photos of it constantly because it was so crazy-looking in comparison to other boats.”
Most of the time, though, the Bayesian operated like a motorboat, powered by two enormous diesel engines. During her five-day voyage, Ms. VanSickle said they sailed only once, for just a few hours. But when they did, the boat moved through the water so smoothly, she said, it felt like they were “gliding.”
A promotional photo from Perini Navi of the Bayesian, which Mr. Lynch named after an 18th-century theory on probability.
EPA, via Shutterstock
A few weeks after Ms. VanSickle got off and returned to her life as a reporter in Washington, Mr. Lynch welcomed aboard his next batch of guests. This was the second celebratory voyage, beginning in mid-August, and Mr. Lynch had planned to get back to London, where he lived, around Aug. 20.
Among the 12 passengers were Mr. Lynch; his wife, Angela Bacares; their 18-year-old daughter, Hannah, who was soon off to Oxford; one of his lead lawyers, Chris Morvillo , and his wife, Neda Nassiri, who designed handcrafted jewelry; Jonathan Bloomer, an international banker and trusted adviser, and his wife, Judy, a psychotherapist celebrated for her charity work.
Mr. Lynch also invited some younger colleagues, including a couple who brought a baby on board. The crew was led by James Cutfield, an experienced New Zealand sailor, backed up by a first mate, a ship engineer, several deckhands and hostesses, totaling 10 in all.
Mr. Lynch was on the rebound, fired up about the possibility of starting a nonprofit to help exonerate people wrongly accused of crimes, said Sir David Davis, a friend and prominent conservative British politician.
Mr. Lynch sent Sir David a text message offering the choice of lunch or dinner in London on Aug. 22, when he was back.
An Unanticipated Storm
The Mediterranean Sea was flat on Aug. 18. But bad weather was moving south, from Naples toward Sicily. The Italian Air Force’s Meteomar forecast warned of scattered thunderstorms, gusts of wind and a rough sea. Several yacht captains said the weather warning was far from specific or extraordinary.
Mr. Borner, the captain who for decades has been running cruises and diving excursions on his old sailboat, the Sir Robert Baden Powell , was finishing up his own trip, picking his way west along the Sicilian coast.
The wind was blowing from the northwest and Mr. Borner figured that the curvature of Sicily’s rugged coastline at Porticello, a small fishing village built around a cove, would shelter him. He arrived in the cove that afternoon, went ashore with his guests and grabbed some pizza.
“It was a nice evening,” he remembered.
While they were in town, the Bayesian chugged into the same cove. It dropped anchor at 9:35 p.m., about a third of a mile from land. As Mr. Borner went to sleep around 11, the night was clear. The lights of the Bayesian’s mast glowed behind him.
Lights illuminating the mast of the Bayseian on Aug. 18.
Baia Santa Nicolicchia/Fabio La Bianca, via Reuters
At midnight on Aug. 19, the Italian Coast Guard put out a warning for a northwesterly Gale Force 8, a serious storm in which winds could reach 46 miles per hour. But the gale was predicted to hit hundreds of miles from Sicily.
Around 3 a.m., Mr. Borner woke up to help some of his passengers catch an early flight from Palermo, Sicily’s biggest city. But as the winds picked up rapidly, whipping the cove into a frothy chop, he scratched his plan to go ashore.
He and his crew shut the portholes and skylights and started the engine, to keep the bow pointed into the wind and prevent the boat from being hit on its side.
On the Bayesian, a young deckhand, Matthew Griffiths, later told the authorities that when the wind hit 20 knots, he woke up the captain, according to a person close to the crew (who said that neither of them was allowed to speak publicly). The captain then gave the order to wake up others, the person said.
At 3:51 a.m., the Bayesian started to drift — first 80 meters one way, then 80 meters another, its data transmitter shows. Maritime experts said this meant it was being blown around and probably dragging its anchor. It’s unclear whether the engines had been started.
At 4:02 a.m., a camera mounted on a boat in Porticello’s cove shows bright blue flashes of lightning. Three minutes later, another at a Porticello cafe captures the wind tearing down deck umbrellas. So much rain hits one of the cameras, it looks as if it’s being blasted with a hose.
Mr. Borner estimated that the wind gusts reached 60 knots, or nearly 70 miles an hour — just below hurricane strength — and said they had pushed his boat onto its side about 15 degrees, a serious lean but nothing close to capsizing.
Reports immediately after the disaster raised the possibility that the Bayesian had been hit by a tornado-like disturbance called a waterspout, but the authorities don’t think that happened. Still, the wind was doing something dangerous: It was changing direction.
According to a nearby weather station, it was blowing west-southwest then southwest, then north-northwest. This increased the chances of getting ambushed by a random gust that could slam into the side of a boat, which can tilt even a big vessel.
A third video shows the Bayesian rocking back and forth and beginning to lean. Then the lights on its giant mast blink out — all but the top one, which was powered by a battery.
By 4:06 a.m., the rain has turned into a blinding cascade. That same minute, the Bayesian’s location signal cuts out. Mr. Borner’s crew squinted through the nearly impenetrable haze of sea spray and rain and spotted a large object in the water. They first thought it was a reef.
“But I knew there was no reef,” Mr. Borner said.
It was the Bayesian, they now believe, knocked onto its side.
“Two Minutes” to Tragedy
At 4:34 a.m., a red emergency flare, bright as a meteor, shot into the sky. The storm had passed, and Mr. Borner and his first mate jumped into a small boat, zooming across the black water.
First they saw cushions floating. Then a flashing light. Then a life raft built for 12 packed with 15 people, bloodied and soaked to the skin, including a baby.
One person had a cut on the head, another on his chest. Some had already been bandaged. They were cold, wet and dazed. They were too shocked, Mr. Borner said, to say what happened.
As he loaded the survivors into his boat and began to head back to the Sir Robert, one woman pleaded with him not to leave.
“Please,” she told him. “Continue searching.”
Some people were still missing.
Mr. Borner decided to unload the survivors onto the Sir Robert, then send his small boat back. His crew gave them blankets and dry clothes. Some survivors were so shaken they needed to be led below deck by hand.
Nobody said much, Mr. Borner remembered.
One man told him: “I was the captain of this.”
Another said the boat had “sunk in two minutes.”
The woman who had begged him to keep searching sat huddled on the deck.
“Are you OK?” Mr. Borner asked her.
“No,” she replied. “I am not OK at all.’’
Capt. Karsten Borner, who rescued the survivors of the Bayesian.
Guglielmo Mangiapane/Reuters
Mr. Borner said he later realized it was Angela Bacares, wife of Mr. Lynch and mother of Hannah Lynch. Neither had made it onto the life raft. (Salamander Davoudi, a spokeswoman for Lynch family, told The Times that Ms. Bacares was not speaking to the media because she was grieving and wanted privacy.)
A few hours after, a string of ambulances arrived at Palermo’s main hospital. Dr. Domenico Cipolla, the head of pediatric emergency, evaluated the youngest survivor, a 1-year-old girl.
The baby was OK, Dr. Cipolla said, but she had experienced quite an ordeal. She and her mother had been sleeping on a sofa on deck because of the rough sea, Dr. Cipolla said, when the boat suddenly lurched and threw them to the deck.
A moment later the boat turned completely on its side, the baby’s father told the doctor, flipping his hand as he described it. The doctor said the mother told him that she and her baby were hurled into the water and that her baby nearly slipped away. But then she grabbed her and swam to a nearby life raft, which was designed to deploy automatically.
The parents were later identified as Charlotte Golunski, a colleague of Mr. Lynch, and James Emslie. Ms. Golunski did not respond to several messages left for her, and efforts to reach Mr. Emslie were unsuccessful.
Officials said the bodies of five passengers were found in this cabin...
engine room
ENGINEER’S
Watertight wall
One additional passenger was found in this cabin.
... opposite a narrow staircase that they could have been using to flee, before a surge of water knocked them backward.
... opposite a narrow staircase that they could have been using to flee, before a surge of water knocked them backward
Mistakes by the Crew?
The biggest question that investigators are focused on is how the Bayesian filled with water so fast. To many in the yachting world, it doesn’t make sense.
The boat had been built with several watertight compartments under the deck, to prevent water from spreading from one area to others. And it had been approved as safe by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, part of Britain’s Department for Transport, and by the American Bureau of Shipping, a private company that reviews boat designs .
On top of that, one Italian official and underwater video footage broadcast on Italian television indicated that there were no holes or other structural damage visible in the hull.
Even so, the Bayesian, like many superyachts, had all kinds of openings in which water could theoretically get in: big air vents for the engines; smaller ones for the kitchen, crew quarters and guest cabins; large glass doors at the back and the sides so that people could walk onto the deck; and various hatches for crew and passenger access.
In interviews with Mr. Costantino, the chief executive of the Italian Sea Group, and his spokeswoman, the company accused the crew of leaving hatches open during the storm, including a doorway-size opening on the left rear of the hull, close to the water line. The spokeswoman claimed that hatch was the only place where so much water could have come gushing in.
The company speculated that the crew did not close a watertight door between this hatch and the engine room. A flooded engine room might explain the sudden blackout that killed the mast lights and then, a few minutes later, the location transmitter.
But witnesses, an Italian official familiar with the investigation and the underwater video challenged the company’s versions of events. The footage appeared to show the watertight door to the engine room closed, and the Italian official said the divers had not seen any open hatches on the hull.
Mr. Borner also said that after rescuing the captain, he asked him if he had shut the hatches. The captain said he had. Mr. Borner shared pictures taken by his guests a few moments before the Bayesian sank that appear to show that hull hatches were closed.
A Compromised Design?
The Bayesian’s origins go back to 2000. That year, Perini hired Ron Holland Design, a premier naval architectural firm, to design a series of 56-meter sailboats, said a person with knowledge of the timeline. As the superrich have become even richer, yachts have grown steadily bigger, and Perini was emerging as one of the world’s best-known builders of superyachts, often defined as motor yachts or sailboats longer than 24 meters, or 79 feet.
The Ron Holland firm, based in Ireland at the time, drew up plans for the hull, keel, rudder and, crucially, the placement of the masts — two masts. All other features, like the cabins, decks and vent system, were designed by Perini, according to the person, who did not want to be identified because of the possibility of legal action connected to the sinking.
In 2003, the first yacht in the series hit the water, the Burrasca (which means storm in Italian). Over the next four years, Perini built three more 56-meter superyachts from these blueprints, all with two masts. On Perini’s website , they look nearly identical.
Then came the Bayesian.
Construction on its hull began in 2005 at a shipyard in Tuzla, Turkey, according to the boat’s documents. But the original buyer for this yacht didn’t want the standard two-mast design. Instead, the Italian Sea Group said, he wanted the boat to be built with one large mast for better sailing performance.
That led to a radically different design, said three people with knowledge of what followed, and a cascade of modifications — some to accommodate the gigantic mast, and some apparently for stylistic or other reasons.
A promotional photo from Perini Navi showing the Bayesian’s mast and sails.
The most obvious departure from the previous Perini ships was the mast itself. Beyond being exceptionally tall — more than 40 feet higher than the original foremast — it was also very heavy, at least 24 tons of aluminum, possibly more. This alone would have challenged the boat’s stability, because so much weight was high above deck.
Since then, many yacht makers have switched to lighter, carbon-fiber masts.
“Technology moved on,” Mr. Costantino said.
Naval engineers pointed out that the heavier a yacht is up high, the more ballast it often needs down low — weight at the bottom of the boat to lower its center of gravity and resist its tendency to lean over.
Small notes on hull diagrams in the Bayesian’s documents show that the Turkish shipyard revised the ballast in July 2006, nearly 10 months after the keel was laid, which is one of the first steps of production.
“Values updated as from information by Yildiz,” the notes say in all caps, naming the shipyard.
But where this ballast was placed was curious, maritime experts said. Rather than spreading the ballast evenly across the bottom of the boat — which would have guaranteed the best stability — the builders stacked it toward the rear of the ship’s hull.
“When I first saw this, I couldn’t believe it,” said Mr. Roberts, the naval architect. “It made no sense to me.”
The ballast seems to have been pushed toward the rear of the boat to offset the single, heavy mast closer toward the front, Mr. Roberts concluded. He said he had never seen the main ballast used in such a design tactic before.
That was not the only change, experts said. A single mast would have plunged almost directly through the wheelhouse, an interior station where the ship can be controlled, so that was moved, too. A deck lounge was added, along with two tall doors on the sides. None of the other Perini yachts in the 56-meter series have these design elements.
Air vents could let in water if the boat tipped over.
If the boat tipped over with these tall doors open, water could pour across the deck and down the main staircase.
Tall deck dors
The Bayesian sat lower in the water than other yachts in the same Perini series, said Stephen Edwards, the Bayesian’s captain from 2015 to 2020. Naval architects said this by itself would make it easier for water to pour through vents and other openings when the boat leans on its side.
Whenever a boat leans too far and water starts gushing in through open doors or vents, it can set off a dangerous downward spiral that is hard to stop and that can sink a boat in minutes.
Such risks are calculated and laid out in a lengthy, proprietary document — kind of a safety bible — for many vessels certified to ply the seas.
The Times has obtained that safety bible, called a stability book, for the Bayesian. Copies of the 88-page book are also sweeping through a global community of experts who are obsessively trying to solve the puzzle of how and why the boat sank. More than a dozen of those experts, including naval architects and engineers, found weaknesses in the Bayesian’s design that they said could have contributed to the disaster.
The stability book obtained by The Times was written before the Lynches bought the boat in 2014, when the yacht was called the Salute and owned by John Groenewoud, a Dutch businessman. In an email, he confirmed signing a contract for “the boat with 1 mast” in 2005, but declined to discuss any safety implications that may have had.
The Times obtained the stability book for another 56-meter Perini yacht, with two masts instead of one. A comparison of the boats showed that the Bayesian was significantly less stable.
Specifically, the data shows that the two-masted ship could lean at least 10 degrees farther onto its side before taking on dangerous amounts of water.
The documents also show that the Bayesian could begin taking on some water at angles that appeared to violate the safety threshold set by the British Maritime and Coastguard Agency.
The Italian Sea Group responded that the boat was in line with regulations and had been approved. When asked how that happened, an agency spokesman refused to clarify, citing the continuing investigations.
The other boat’s documents also showed that the sister yacht sat a little higher in the water than the Bayesian did, as Mr. Edwards emphasized. And under many circumstances, experts said, the sister ship had a better center of gravity and was more resistant to capsizing, two additional factors that would have made it safer.
“The other boat is, at least on paper, a better boat,” Mr. Roberts said.
To make boats safer, naval architects said they religiously ensured that vent openings are far from the water line. When showed a picture of a 56-meter Perini yacht that, like the Bayesian, had vents built into the hull, Philipp Luke, a Dutch naval architect, started violently shaking his head.
“No, no, no,” he said. “You don’t do that.”
In the end, several naval architects said, all these flaws may have come together at the worst time — in a sudden storm.
Two Spanish naval engineers, Guillermo Gefaell and Juan Manuel López, calculated that the sheer size of the Bayesian’s mast and rigging made the yacht a wind catcher, even with the sails down.
Writing for the Association of Naval and Ocean Engineers of Spain, they used a computer model to calculate what would have happened to the Bayesian if a strong gust of roughly 54 knots, around 62 mph, hit its side. Under those conditions, the Spanish engineers estimated, the Bayesian could lean dynamically and take on nearly a ton of water each second through an engine room vent.
In an interview, Mr. Gefaell noted that he, like almost everyone else, did not know everything that happened that night. But if the gusts were as strong as Mr. Borner estimated — 60 knots — the punch would have pushed the boat to an even more severe angle, his calculations showed, very quickly knocking the boat all the way over onto its side, as the witnesses recounted.
At that point, Mr. Gefaell said, “the boat was certainly lost.”
A Watery Maze
Within hours of the sinking, emergency divers plunged in. Their mission: Find survivors.
The Bayesian sat 160 feet below the surface, leaning on its right side on the seabed. The once-gleaming cabins were clogged with chairs, clothes, curtains and the enormous number of seat cushions that Ms. Bacares had brought onboard to make the boat more comfortable. The search was made even more difficult and dangerous, divers said, by the many mirrors installed below deck that now reflected back their lights in a disorienting, watery maze.
On the first day, divers found the body of the yacht’s chef, Recaldo Thomas, floating near the boat. Over the next three days, they found the bodies of Mr. Lynch and four other passengers in a small cabin near the foot of a narrow staircase leading down from the deck to the passenger’s quarters. Finally, divers discovered the body of the last missing person, Hannah Lynch, trapped behind furniture in a nearby cabin.
One Italian official said the six passengers might have been trying to climb the main guest staircase when a surge of water poured down the stairs and knocked them back into the cabins. With the boat flipped on its side, water gushing in, and total darkness, it would have been nearly impossible for anyone below deck to escape, experts said.
The Italian authorities plan to raise the wreck to inspect it more closely. That could take months. In the meantime, at least two major investigations are unfolding, one by Italian prosecutors and the other by the British Marine Accident Investigation Branch.
Rescue workers bringing the body of the final Bayesian victim to shore, in Porticello, Italy, on Aug. 23.
Igor Petyx/EPA, via Shutterstock
From the first weeks after the accident, Italian prosecutors said that Mr. Cutfield, the captain, and two of his crew were under investigation.
Mr. Cutfield hasn’t said a word publicly and did not respond to messages asking for comment. Several crew members, when approached at a hotel in Sicily in August, said they had all been put under a gag order. When asked who imposed it, they responded: “No comment.”
In the yachting world, Mr. Cutfield has some solid references. Turgay Ciner, a Turkish industrial magnate and sailing enthusiast, employed him to run his yacht for 12 years.
“He never made any mistakes,” Mr. Ciner said.
Mr. Ciner, speaking by phone from Istanbul, recounted a bad storm near Capri about 10 years ago that Mr. Cutfield handled. They were sailing on another 56-meter Perini yacht, the Melek, a two-masted boat in the same series as the Bayesian. He said that Mr. Cutfield performed very well and was “one out of a hundred.”
Why Mr. Cutfield left in a lifeboat with the other survivors when a half dozen passengers were still missing is a matter Italian prosecutors are looking into.
But several yacht captains have defended Mr. Cutfield, saying that whatever happened that night, it happened very quickly.
When a boat sinks fast, said Adam Hauck, an American yacht captain, there’s not much hope for anyone still onboard. The adage of the captain going down with the ship, he said, is antiquated and unrealistic.
“It’s not like a Titanic movie where you’re going through the water and you can just look in the rooms,” Mr. Hauck said. “At some point, you can’t go back for people.”
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Mother recounts the harrowing moment she lost her 1-year-old amid superyacht shipwreck
A survivor of the luxury superyacht that sank near Sicily during a violent storm says she saved her 1-year-old by holding her above the rough and choppy waters.
The mother has been identified as 35-year-old Charlotte Golunski by Agenzia Nazionale Stampa Associata (ANSA), an Italian national news agency. She was among the 12 passengers and 10 crew members on board the Bayesian, a 184-foot sailboat, when it capsized in the early hours of Aug. 19 off the coast of Sicily, a village in southern Italy. The boat belonged to British tech magnate, Mike Lynch, who is still missing, along with five others.
Speaking to la Repubblica , an Italian newspaper, Golunski recounted battling turbulent waves to keep her daughter alive.
“I kept her afloat with all my strength, my arms stretched upwards so she wouldn’t drown. It was all dark. In the water, I couldn’t keep my eyes open. I was screaming for help, but all I could hear around me was the screams of others.”
In a separate interview with ANSA, Golunski is reported to have briefly lost her daughter while in the water.
“For two seconds, I lost the child in the water; then I immediately hugged her again amid the fury of the waves. I held her tightly, close to me, while the sea was stormy. Many were screaming.”
“Luckily, the lifeboat inflated, and 11 of us managed to get on it. It was terrible. In a few minutes, the boat was hit by a very strong wind and sank shortly after.”
Golunski was on board the yacht with the child’s father, James Emsili, who also survived the incident.
Several passengers and crew on board the ship are still missing. Read on for more about the luxury yacht accident that occurred near Sicily.
How did the yacht sink in Sicily?
In a statement obtained by NBC News, Italy’s coast guard confirmed that the Bayesian sank “due to a violent storm” off Palermo at around 5 a.m. local time (11 p.m. ET).
Who was on the yacht that sunk?
Twelve passengers and 10 crew members were on board a superyacht called the “Bayesian” when it was hit by a storm and capsized.
According to NBC News , the ship's passengers were American, British and Canadian citizens.
So far, 15 people have been rescued, and one death has been confirmed. The body of the ship’s cook, Ricardo Thomas, was recovered on Aug. 19.
Mike Lynch, a 59-year-old British Irish entrepreneur dubbed by the U.K. media as “Britain’s Bill Gates,” was also on the ship, according to NBC News. Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah, are among the six people who’ve yet to be accounted for in the search for the missing. His wife, Angela Bacares, was among the rescued.
Did Mike Lynch own the yacht?
The superyacht Bayesian belonged to Mike Lynch. The technology entrepreneur was also the co-founder of Autonomy Corporation, a software company, and Invoke Capital, a venture capital fund.
Alex Portée is a senior trending reporter at TODAY Digital and is based in Los Angeles.
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Search resumes for British tech magnate and 5 others after yacht sinks off Sicily
The Associated Press
Emergency services at the scene of the search for a missing boat Monday in Porticello Santa Flavia, Italy. Alberto Lo Bianco/LaPresse/AP hide caption
PORTICELLO, Sicily — Rescue teams and divers were returning to the site of a storm-sunken superyacht off Sicily on Tuesday to search for six people, including British tech magnate Mike Lynch, who are believed to be still trapped in the hull, 50 meters (164 feet) underwater.
Divers were loading a rescue dinghy at the port of Porticello, near Palermo, after a first search Monday ended unsuccessfully. Fire rescue crews reported that divers were unable to access the below-deck cabins because they were blocked by debris that had shifted during the violent storm that toppled the luxury sailboat early Monday.
Who are Mike Lynch and the other people missing after a yacht sank in Sicily?
Fifteen people survived, including a mother who reported holding her 1-year-old baby over the waves to save her. One body has been recovered, officials said.
“Access was limited to the bridge, due to the difficulty represented by the presence of furnishings obstructing the divers’ passage,” the fire crews said in a statement.
The search was made particularly difficult because the ship was resting on the seabed at a depth of 50 meters, which limits the amount of time divers can be underwater, said fire rescue spokesperson Luca Cari. As a result, the search is expected to take time, he told The Associated Press early Tuesday.
The 56-meter (184-foot) British-flagged Bayesian luxury yacht had been moored about a half-mile off Ponticello when a storm rolled in around 4 a.m. Monday. Civil protection officials said they believed the ship was struck by a tornado over the water, known as a waterspout, which had passed over the area.
Fifteen of the Bayesian’s 22 passengers and crew managed to escape, first onto a lifeboat and then by a nearby sailboat, the Sir Robert Baden Powell, that had also been moored offshore to ride out the storm, Karsten Borner, the captain of the Baden Powell, told reporters at the scene.
One body, belonging to the Bayesian’s chef, was recovered nearby.
Among those missing was Lynch , who was once hailed as Britain’s king of technology. He was cleared in June of fraud and conspiracy charges in a U.S. federal trial related to Hewlett Packard’s $11 billion takeover of his company, Autonomy Corp. His wife, Angela Bacares, survived.
The vacation appeared to be something of a celebration after Lynch's acquittal, with guests including some of the people who had stood by Lynch throughout the ordeal. Among those unaccounted for, according to the civil protection agency, were one of Lynch’s U.S. lawyers, Christopher Morvillo of Clifford Chance, and Morvillo’s wife. Also among the missing was Jonathan Bloomer, the former head of the Autonomy audit committee who testified at Lynch’s trial, and his wife.
Among the survivors was Charlotte Golunski, who said she momentarily lost hold of her 1-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. The father, identified by ANSA as James Emslie, also survived.
The yacht, built in 2008 by the Italian firm Perini Navi, was carrying 12 passengers and 10 crew. According to online charter companies, it has been available for charter for 195,000 euros (about $215,000) a week and is notable for its massive 75-meter tall aluminum mast, one of the tallest in the world.
Watch CBS News
Captain, 2 crew members from Mike Lynch's family yacht reportedly under investigation over sinking off Italy
By Anna Matranga
Updated on: August 28, 2024 / 10:47 AM EDT / CBS News
Rome — The engineer and a sailor from the crew of the luxury superyacht that sank off the coast of Sicily , killing British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter along with five other people, have been placed under investigation by Italian prosecutors along with the captain of the vessel, according to the Reuters and ANSA news agencies. CBS News could not immediately reach the prosecutors or lawyers for the Bayesian yacht's crew members to confirm the development, which comes about a week and a half after the vessel capsized on Aug. 19.
Engineer Tim Parker Eaton and sailor Matthew Griffiths, who was on night watch duty when the incident occurred, were reportedly placed under formal investigation for possible manslaughter and culpable shipwreck a few days after the 184-foot Bayesian yacht's captain, James Cutler, whose lawyers have confirmed that he's a subject of the probe.
After meeting with prosecutors for several days, Cutler, a 51-year-old New Zealander, has declined to answer any further questions, his lawyer said Wednesday.
"The captain exercised his right to remain silent for two fundamental reasons," attorney Giovanni Rizzuti told reporters. "First, he's very worn out. Second, we were appointed only on Monday and for a thorough and correct defense case, we need to acquire a set of data that at the moment we don't have."
Lynch and his daughter Hannah, 18, were among the passengers and one crew members who died when the superyacht sank rapidly during a violent storm in the pre-dawn hours of Aug. 19. The capsize of the high-tech vessel quickly raised questions, as another sailboat that had been anchored nearby off the coast of Palermo made it through the storm unscathed.
Fifteen people, including Lynch's wife Angela Bacares, escaped to a life raft and were rescued by another boat that had been in the vicinity.
According to reports by Italian media, investigators are looking into whether the engineer, Eaton, might have neglected to activate security systems designed to automatically close all the hatches on the vessel, leaving the engine room to flood and possibly causing a power outage and the subsequent rapid flooding of the entire yacht.
Under Italian law, being placed under investigation does not necessarily mean formal charges will follow.
During a press conference on Saturday, prosecutors said the investigation would require the wreck of the Bayesian to be salvaged from the seabed, where it currently sits at a depth of about 160 feet.
Chief prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio said his team would work to determine whether the captain, other crew members, or the yacht's manufacturers bear any responsibility for the sinking.
- Boat Accident
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Dramatic video shows 130ft superyacht sinking off Italy coast after being battered in storm
Nine people rescued before boat went under, article bookmarked.
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Dramatic footage has captured the moment a 40-metre superyacht sank into the Mediterranean sea after being battered in a storm.
The 40-metre-long luxury vessel was sailing from Gallipoli to Milazzo overnight on Saturday when it got into trouble around 15km from Italy’s Catanzaro Marina.
Footage shows the yacht, named My Saga, rapidly disappearing beneath waves, as lifeboats appear to float beside it.
The captain sent out a distress call to the Port Authority of Crotone, with officials told the yacht was taking on a significant amount of water from the stern.
The Italian coastguard dispatched two patrol vessels and rescued all four passengers and five crew members on board.
A tugboat sent out at dawn was unable to save the superyacht from sinking because of worsening weather conditions, the Super Yacht Times reports. The Saga finally sank at around 1pm on Sunday.
The outlet reports the yacht, which was built in Monaco back in 2007, was flying under the Cayman Islands flag with an all-Italian crew when it sunk.
An investigation has been launched into the cause.
It comes after a £6 million superyacht sunk after it went up in flames in the UK on the Torquay harbourside.
The 85ft vessel was consumed by fire , with thick black smoking billowing into the sky.
The yacht reportedly drifted out into the harbour after the fire burnt through ropes securing it to the pier, but the vessel was later secured by the fire service.
A fire service statement revealed that the vessel contained approximately 8000 litres of diesel fuel.
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Who was on superyacht that sank off Sicily?
Twenty-two people were on board the Bayesian superyacht including British technology tycoon Mike Lynch, his wife and 18-year-old daughter, and Morgan Stanley International boss Jonathan Bloomer.
Friday 23 August 2024 12:34, UK
Details have emerged of the 22 people who were on board the superyacht that sank off the coast of Sicily.
The British-flagged vessel named Bayesian was carrying 12 passengers and 10 members of crew when it got into difficulty in the early hours of Monday.
Seven bodies have now been recovered. The other 15 people on board were rescued.
Here's what we know about those who were on the yacht.
Follow latest updates on the superyacht sinking
British technology tycoon Mike Lynch was among the original six people missing. On Thursday, divers confirmed his body had been recovered.
Raised in Ilford, east London by Irish parents, the 59-year-old made millions with the software company Autonomy he set up in 1996.
He had an estimated net worth of £852m, according to the 2023 Sunday Times Rich List, and is believed to have owned the yacht.
Off the back of Automomy's global success, Mr Lynch was given the roles of science adviser to former prime minister David Cameron and non-executive director of the BBC.
The Cambridge maths and sciences graduate sold the firm for £8.64bn to US giant Hewlett Packard (HP) in 2011.
Dubbed the "British Bill Gates", Mr Lynch has been in the headlines in recent months over a high-profile fraud case related to the sale of Autonomy to HP in 2011.
HP accused him of deliberately overstating the value of the company before it was acquired by the American technology firm. Mr Lynch denied any wrongdoing.
In June, a US jury cleared him of all charges .
Read more: Lynch's co-defendant dies days before yacht disaster
Hannah Lynch
Mr Lynch's 18-year-old daughter Hannah Lynch was also on board. A body believed to be that of the teenager was recovered on Friday from the yacht wreckage.
She had been on holiday with her parents, having secured a place to study English at the University of Oxford, according to reports.
Her former school, Latymer Upper School in Hammersmith, west London, said they were "incredibly shocked by the news that Hannah and her father are among those missing in this tragic accident" when the yacht first sank.
Angela Bacares
Mr Lynch's wife Angela Bacares was on board the yacht and was rescued.
The 57-year-old said she and Mr Lynch were awoken by the boat "tilting" at 4am - half an hour before it sank.
Jonathan Bloomer
Jonathan Bloomer, the chairman of investment bank Morgan Stanley International, was confirmed dead on Thursday.
According to the Financial Times, Mr Bloomer appeared as a defence witness for Mr Lynch during his US criminal trial and the pair were good friends. He also chaired Autonomy's audit committee.
The 70-year-old was the chief executive of UK-Hong Kong insurer Prudential until he was ousted by the board in 2005.
He was also chairman of the insurance provider Hiscox.
Judy Bloomer
Mr Bloomer's wife Judy was on the yacht trip with her husband. Divers confirmed they found her body on Thursday.
Mrs Bloomer was a former board member at The Eve Appeal charity, which focuses on gynaecological cancers.
The charity described her as a "brilliant champion for women's health and medical research... an incredible supporter, committee member, and trustee of our charity for over 20 years".
Read more: 'Alarming' potential cause of superyacht disaster What we know about superyacht that sank
Recaldo Thomas
The yacht's on-board chef Recaldo Thomas died in the sinking.
He was Canadian-Antiguan and part of the crew of the Bayesian.
His body was the first to be recovered from the wreckage.
Chris Morvillo
US lawyer Chris Morvillo was among those divers found dead on Thursday.
The father-of-two worked on Mr Lynch's US fraud trial and was a partner of law firm Clifford Chance's US branch.
Mr Morvillo was assistant attorney for the Southern District of New York between 1995 and 2005 and worked on the terrorist investigation into the 9/11 attacks.
In a recent LinkedIn post, he thanked the legal team that helped win Mr Lynch's trial.
Signing off the post, he said: "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…."
Neda Morvillo
Mr Morvillo's wife Neda died in the disaster alongside her husband.
The 57-year-old had a luxury jewellery brand, which she ran under her maiden name Neda Nassiri.
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
Ayla Ronald
Ayla Ronald, a senior associate at Clifford Chance, survived the yacht disaster, the law firm confirmed.
The 36-year-old worked alongside Chris Morvillo in helping defend Mike Lynch in court.
Clifford Chance said in a statement: "Our utmost priority is providing support to the family as well as our colleague Ayla Ronald, who together with her partner, thankfully survived the incident."
She is originally from Christchurch, New Zealand, but lives in London, her father told local media there.
He said she was left "very shaken" but "she and her partner are alive".
Charlotte Golunski
Charlotte Golunski was on board the yacht and was rescued along with her one-year-old daughter, Sofia.
She spoke to Italian newspaper La Repubblica, confirming she survived the yacht sinking and told how she kept her daughter alive after she was rescued.
"I held her afloat with all my strength, my arms stretched upwards to keep her from drowning," she said.
"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 35-year-old is a partner at one of Mr Lynch's firms - Invoke Capital - and has worked there since 2012, according to her LinkedIn profile.
She also worked at Hewlett Packard, which acquired Autonomy in 2011, for 11 months.
Before that, she studied history at the University of Oxford.
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James Emsley
Ms Golunski's partner James Emsley was also rescued from the yacht, according to Sicily's civil protection agency.
The 36-year-old is the father of her one-year-old daughter.
James Cutfield
The 51-year-old captain of the yacht spoke to Italian newspaper La Repubblica after he was rescued.
Mr Cutfield, from New Zealand, was taken for treatment at the Termini Imerese emergency unit, where he told the newspaper: "We didn't see it coming."
Leah Randall
Leah Randall was part of the Bayesian crew and survived the sinking.
She was pictured going ashore in Porticello on Monday morning and is from South Africa.
Her mother Heidi told Sky News said she was "beyond relieved that my daughter's life was spared by the grace of God".
"It doesn't make it any easier living with the heartache of those who have lost their lives [or are] missing. My very deepest condolences to the chef's family as they formed a great friendship," she said.
Katja Chicken
Katja Chicken was another South African member of crew on board the Bayesian and was pictured being brought to safety in Porticello on Monday.
The Italian coastguard confirmed on Tuesday evening that Leo Eppel, a crew member, also survived the yacht sinking.
Related Topics
- Superyacht sinking
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IMAGES
COMMENTS
Aug. 20, 2024, 11:16 PM UTC. By Henry Austin and Corky Siemaszko. Newly released video captures a luxury superyacht being battered by a violent storm before it suddenly sank off Sicily with 22 ...
Emergency services at the scene of the search for a missing boat, in Porticello, southern Italy, Tuesday, Aug. 20, 2024. Rescue teams and divers returned to the site of a storm-sunken superyacht Tuesday to search for six people, including British tech magnate Mike Lynch, who are believed to be still trapped in the hull 50 meters (164-feet) underwater.
Rescue workers bringing the body of the final Bayesian victim to shore, in Porticello, Italy, on Aug. 23. ... When a boat sinks fast, said Adam Hauck, an American yacht captain, there's not much ...
Israeli airstrike in northern Gaza kills over 90 people. Authorities in Italy have opened a manslaughter investigation into the sinking of a superyacht, which killed British tech tycoon Mike Lynch ...
Italy's coast guard said in a statement that the 184-foot sailboat, named the Bayesian, sank "due to a violent storm" off Palermo at around 5 a.m. local time (11 p.m. ET) with 22 people on board.
Israeli airstrike in northern Gaza kills over 90 people. Initial autopsies of four of the seven victims who died when a superyacht sank in a storm in Italy last month show they died of "dry ...
The three crew members were among 15 survivors of the Aug. 19 sinking that killed British tech magnate Mike Lynch, his daughter Hannah and five others. Chief prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio, who is heading the investigation, has said his team will consider each possible element of responsibility including those of the captain, the crew ...
Moment superyacht sinks off the coast of Italy Footage has emerged of the moment a superyacht completely sank into the Mediterranean Sea. The 40-metre vessel got into difficulty about 15km off the ...
10 of 14 | . Emergency services at the scene of the search for a missing boat, in Porticello Santa Flavia, Italy, Monday, Aug. 19, 2024. British tech giant Mike Lynch, his lawyer and four other people are among those missing after their luxury superyacht sank during a freak storm off Sicily, Italy's civil protection and authorities said.
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 ...
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 ...
Aug. 22, 2024, 8:28 AM PDT. By Claudia Rizzo, Claudio Lavanga and Yuliya Talmazan. PORTICELLO, Italy — Survivors of a storm that sank a superyacht off Sicily recounted their ordeal to one of the ...
How did the yacht sink in Sicily? ... Sicily, in southern Italy, where the sail yacht Bayasian under UK flag sank, on Aug. 19, 2024. Italian Coast Guard via AP Did Mike Lynch own the yacht?
The Bayesian set off on a leisurely cruise around Italy's southern coast on a sunny day in late July. The luxurious super yacht − which boasted one of the largest masts in the world and carried ...
Porticello, Italy CNN —. Italian authorities say a fifth body has been found in the search for those missing from the "Bayesian" superyacht, which sank off the coast of Sicily earlier in the ...
Search continues for 6 after luxury superyacht sinks off Sicily Rescue teams were returning to the site of a sunken yacht off Sicily on Tuesday to search for six people, including British tech ...
Italian prosecutors launch manslaughter investigation into superyacht sinking 02:33. Rome — The engineer and a sailor from the crew of the luxury superyacht that sank off the coast of Sicily ...
The luxury yacht sunk off the coast of the Sicilian capital of Palermo in Italy. The 56-metre-long sailboat sank with 22 people on board shortly before sunrise, the Italian coast guard said in a ...
The 40-metre luxury vessel was sailing from Gallipoli to Milazzo when it got into trouble and took on water. The Italian coastguard rescued nine people on board before the yacht disappeared beneath waves.
The yacht's on-board chef Recaldo Thomas died in the sinking. He was Canadian-Antiguan and part of the crew of the Bayesian. His body was the first to be recovered from the wreckage.
It's pretty shocking that a boat with no sail area could get knocked over bad enough to sink that quickly. Something had to be seriously wrong with the design. I'm not particularly salty, but I've sailed in 25-30kts with the rail buried and not even had a second thought about the boat sinking.
Video shows moment Italy yacht sinks during violent storm. CCTV video appears to show the moment the "Bayesian" yacht disappears as it capsizes in Palermo, Italy. Aug. 20, 2024.
THESE incredible photos show the wreck of a £14million superyacht after it was raised from the sea floor. The flashy yacht, called Atina, sank after a devastating fire broke out on board. The ...