Fifteen people managed to escape the yacht before it capsized in the pre-dawn tempest, while the body of the onboard chef, Canadian-Antiguan national Recaldo Thomas, was found near the wreck hours after the disaster.
The Bayesian is lying on its side at a depth of around 50 metres, apparently largely intact.
Besides the diving team, the coast guard has deployed a remotely operated vehicle to scan the seabed and take underwater pictures and videos that it said may provide “useful and timely elements” for prosecutors looking into the disaster.
The coast guard has been questioning survivors, including the captain of the Bayesian, and passengers on the yacht that was moored next to it who witnessed the ship going down, judicial sources said.
No one is under investigation at the moment, sources added.
Experts have been at a loss to explain how a large luxury vessel, presumed to have top-class fittings and safety features, could have sunk within minutes, as recounted by witnesses. The yacht anchored next to it was unharmed by the storm.
The Bayesian, which was owned by Lynch’s wife, was built by Italian shipbuilder Perini in 2008 and last refitted in 2020. It had the world’s tallest aluminium mast, measuring 72 metres, according to its makers.
Lynch has been referred to as Britain’s Bill Gates. He built the UK’s largest software firm, Autonomy, which was sold to HP for $US11 billion in 2011, after which the deal spectacularly unravelled with the US tech giant accusing him of fraud, resulting in a lengthy trial.
He was acquitted on all charges by a jury in San Francisco in June. Morvillo had represented him at the trial, while Bloomer was a character witness on his behalf.
Bayesian’s captain James Cutfield, a 51-year-old New Zealander who survived the shipwreck, was a “very good sailor” and “very well respected” in the Mediterranean, his brother Mark told The New Zealand Herald.
Matthew Schanck, chair of the Maritime Search and Rescue Council, a UK-based non-profit organisation that trains sea rescuers, said the Bayesian was the victim of a “high impact” weather-related incident.
“If it was a water spout, which it appears to be, it’s what I would class as like a black swan event,” he told Reuters, meaning a rare and unpredictable phenomenon.
Reuters
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