Five superyacht victims found in same cabin ‘trying to escape’, Italian investigators reveal

Five passengers who died on the superyacht Bayesian were found in one cabin where they had gathered in an apparent attempt to escape, Italian investigators revealed yesterday.

The five included Mike Lynch, the multimillionaire tech entrepreneur and owner of the yacht. The body of his daughter, Hannah, 18, was found alone in another cabin.

At a press conference in the town of Termini Imerese, about 32km from where the yacht sank off the coast of Sicily, prosecutors confirmed that they were investigating charges of multiple manslaughter and causing a deadly shipwreck against “unidentified persons”.

The chief prosecutor in the case, Ambrogio Cartosio, said he was investigating a “crime hypothesis” of culpable shipwreck and manslaughter, although those charges have not yet been levelled at anybody specifically. The investigation is in the very earliest stages, Cartosio added.

James Cutfield, the Kiwi captain of S/Y Bayesian, was questioned for two hours by investigators earlier this week. Photo / Perini Navi / Facebook

Questions have been asked about why six passengers died while all but one of the crew – the boat’s chef – managed to escape the sinking ship and survive.

It is not clear whether the captain and crew tried to raise the alarm and evacuate the passengers from their cabins.

James Cutfield, the New Zealander who was captain of the yacht, was questioned for two hours by investigators earlier this week.

Raffaele Cammarano, one of two prosecutors leading the case, said: “there can be no certainty about the behaviour of the passengers on board, at the moment”.

“It is probable they tried to escape but we have no real details about that, that will emerge in the course of the inquiry.”

He said the passengers “were asleep below deck and the others weren’t”.

The interior layout of the Bayesian superyacht that specialist divers have been searching.

Asked if Lynch and his guests were warned of the approaching storm that caused the yacht’s sinking, he said: “that’s precisely what we’re trying to ascertain from the statements made by the survivors”.

Girolamo Bentivoglio Fiandra, a senior officer from the fire service, said that when the boat sank, it came to rest on its starboard (right) side.

“The yacht tended to the right and obviously the [people] tried to go to the other side and take refuge in their cabins,” he said.

“We found five bodies in a cabin on the left and another one in the third cabin on the left. They were in the higher part of the shipwreck.”

The tragedy unfolded in the early hours of last Monday (local time) when the Bayesian was hit by an intense storm as it was anchored about a kilometre off the small town of Porticello.

Prosecutors said it was not a tornado but a downburst – a weather phenomenon in which powerful winds descend from a thunderstorm and spread out once they hit sea or land. They can cause damage equivalent to a tornado.

Hannah Lynch, 18, died with six others, including her father, the multimillionaire tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch, when the Bayesian sank off the coast of Porticello in Sicily.

Investigators said the storm was “an extreme event” that happened “really, really suddenly”.

As well as Lynch and his daughter, others who died include Jonathan Bloomer, the Morgan Stanley International bank chairman, and his wife Judy; Chris Morvillo, a lawyer, and his wife Neda. The seventh victim was Recaldo Thomas, the Canadian boat cook, whose body was recovered at the scene on Monday local time.

Cartosio said there was no legal obligation for the skipper and crew, who are currently staying in a four-star hotel a few kilometres from where the yacht went down, to remain in Sicily.

But he said he expects them to stay and to show “maximum co-operation” with the investigation, adding that they have so far been “very co-operative”, and he may want to question them again.

The investigators were asked if there is any evidence that any of the yacht’s hatches were open when the storm hit.

Cammarano said: “this kind of evidence is going to be fundamental to the inquiry so it is extremely difficult or impossible for us to reply at this stage, we are still trying to establish the facts”.

Weather forecasts for the area had not suggested such an extreme event, said Rear Admiral Raffaele Macauda, of the Italian coastguard.

“This was an abnormal meteorological condition, and as you can see from the internet there was forecasts from midnight to 4am, winds of a strength of five from the north-west and the west and a storm alert. But there wasn’t an alert of a tornado,” he said.

Cartosio was asked how such a large, sophisticated yacht could have sunk in a few minutes. He said that was one of the key questions that investigators will be pursuing.

Divers have yet to find the yacht’s black box because of difficulties in searching the vessel, which is lying 50m beneath the surface.

Prosecutors refused to reveal any details about whether divers had found that hatches had been left open, allowing water to flood in, or whether the keel had been raised before the coming storm, making the yacht more unstable.

“We can’t reveal anything at this stage. The whole matter is sub judice and we’re waiting for an analysis to confirm the information,” they said.

The yacht will be raised from the seabed and recovered as part of the investigation, prosecutors said, with the cost to be borne by the vessel’s owners.

Cartosio would not say when the operation would begin nor how long it could take.

Post-mortem examinations have not yet been conducted on the seven victims, investigators said.