The body of UK tech mogul Mike Lynch was retrieved from his submerged yacht off the coast of Sicily on Thursday, as search efforts continued for one remaining missing person.
Specialist divers are still searching for a missing woman, a coastguard official informed AFP.
A source close to the investigation earlier suggested that Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter, Hannah, was still unaccounted for.
On Wednesday, divers recovered four bodies from the wreckage of the yacht “Bayesian,” and another body was brought ashore in Porticello, a coastal town in northern Sicily near Palermo, on Thursday morning.
This latest recovery brings the death toll to six, following the discovery of a man believed to be the yacht’s chef shortly after the vessel sank during a storm in the early hours of Monday.
The 56-meter (185-foot) British-flagged sailing yacht had been anchored approximately 700 meters off the coast of Porticello when it was struck by a waterspout, similar to a small tornado. The yacht sank within minutes.
Fifteen people were rescued, including Lynch’s wife, but Lynch and his daughter were among the six people initially reported missing.
The passengers were guests of 59-year-old Lynch, a renowned technology entrepreneur and investor often compared to Bill Gates, who were celebrating his recent acquittal in a major U.S. fraud case.
Among the missing were Lynch’s lawyer, Christopher Morvillo, and his wife, Neda, as well as Jonathan Bloomer, the chairman of Morgan Stanley International, and his wife, Judy.
Many questions remain about the cause of the yacht’s sinking, and on Thursday, the head of the company that built the vessel suggested that the disaster could have been prevented.
Giovanni Costantino, head of the Italian Sea Group, which owns the Perini Navi company that constructed “Bayesian,” told Italy’s Corriere della Sera newspaper that the tragedy resulted from a series of preventable errors.
“Everything that was done reveals a very long summation of errors,” Costantino stated. He pointed out that the bad weather was forecasted, and all passengers should have been gathered at a designated assembly point with doors and hatches securely closed.
