Deep seas and tight spaces impede search for 6 missing after yacht sinks off Sicily

PORTICELLO, Sicily —  Police divers resumed searching Tuesday for six people believed trapped in the hull of a superyacht that sank in deep seas off Sicily, including British tech magnate Mike Lynch, who was celebrating his recent acquittal on fraud charges with the people who had defended him at trial.

The luxury sailboat, off Porticello near Palermo, was some 165 feet underwater — far deeper than most recreational divers are certified for and a depth that requires special precautions. Recovery crews could stay only for 12-minute shifts, a measure that slowed efforts to reach the cramped inside of the wreck.

Divers tag-teamed the shifts and were using a remote-controlled underwater vehicle, or ROV, to help in the search. They hadn’t been able to access the below-deck cabins because they were blocked by furniture that shifted when a violent storm struck the vessel early Monday. Rescue crews said they assume the missing six are in those cabins because the storm struck when most would be sleeping, but the teams haven’t verified their presence there through portholes.

The Bayesian, a 184-foot British-flagged yacht, was moored about half a mile offshore when a storm rolled in before 4 a.m. Monday. Civil protection officials said they believed the ship was struck by a tornado over the water, known as a waterspout.

Grainy film from closed-circuit cameras from shore, broadcast on the website of the Giornale di Sicilia, showed the illuminated 246-foot mast of the Bayesian weathering the storm and then disappearing over the course of a minute.

Fifteen of the 22 people aboard survived, including a mother who reported holding her 1-year-old baby over the waves to save her. One body has been recovered, identified by officials as the onboard chef. The rest of the 10-person crew survived, including the captain, whom prosecutors reportedly sought to interview.

The survivors were rescued by a nearby sailboat after getting into a lifeboat.

Lynch, who was once hailed as Britain’s king of technology, was cleared in June of fraud and conspiracy charges in a U.S. federal trial related to Hewlett-Packard Co.’s $11-billion takeover of his company, Autonomy Corp. His wife, Angela Bacares, survived the sinking. Hannah Lynch, the couple’s 18-year-old daughter, is reportedly unaccounted for.

Also unaccounted for are Christopher Morvillo, one of Lynch’s lawyers, and Jonathan Bloomer, a chairman at Morgan Stanley International and the former head of the Autonomy audit committee who testified in Lynch’s defense.

Karsten Borner, the captain of the Sir Robert Baden Powell, which rescued the survivors who managed to get into a lifeboat, said he was close enough to be able to see the Bayesian as the storm came in.

“A moment later, she was gone,” he said. “They said they went flat on the water and were sunk in two minutes,” Borner added, quoting the survivors.

Luca Cari, a spokesman for the rescue teams, said the search was proceeding much more slowly than another big shipwreck in Italy, the 2012 Costa Concordia cruise ship that flipped on its side off Tuscany’s coast, because of the depth of the wreck and the space divers have to maneuver.

“That was much simpler. Here everything is more tight,” he said.

The outing was intended at least in part as a celebration of Lynch’s acquittal and a “looking forward to what was coming next,” said Reid Weingarten, a Washington attorney and a member of Lynch’s defense team who was not on the yacht.

Among the survivors, the Emslie-Golunski family was released from Palermo’s pediatric hospital on Tuesday. Charlotte Golunski had reported that 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 they were both pulled to safety, doctors said.

The father, identified by ANSA news agency as James Emslie, also survived.

“They don’t talk much, primarily because they consider themselves survivors and they don’t understand why they survived given what they went through,” said Dr. Domenico Cipolla, head of the emergency room at Di Cristina pediatric hospital.

Speaking to reporters Tuesday, Cipolla said the parents had been in touch with other survivors, who are being housed at a nearby hotel and were waiting for other family members to arrive in Sicily.

The Bayesian, built in 2008 by the Italian firm Perini Navi, is registered to Revtom Ltd., according to online maritime database Equasis. Bacares, Lynch’s wife, is listed as Revtom’s sole owner, according to corporate registration documents from the Isle of Man.

According to online charter companies, it had been available for charter for about $215,000 a week and was notable for its massive aluminum mast, one of the tallest in the world.

The coast guard said to date there was no trace of fuel leaks from the wreckage.

In a separate event, Lynch’s co-defendant in the Autonomy trial who was also cleared, Stephen Chamberlain, was killed Sunday when he was hit by a car while running in Cambridgeshire, England, said Chamberlain’s lawyer, Gary Lincenberg.

Associated Press writers Stellacci and Rosa reported from Porticello, Winfield from Rome. AP writers Eric Tucker in Washington and Danica Kirka and Kelvin Chan in London contributed to this report.