UK tech tycoon among six missing after sudden storm

Italian Coast Guard boat prepares to search for six others missing after recovering a victim due to a sailboat sinking off the coast of Porticello, northwestern Sicily Island, on August 19, 2024. [AFP]

UK tech tycoon Mike Lynch was among six people lost at sea Monday after a superyacht sank off the Italian island of Sicily during a sudden storm.

The 56-metre (180-foot) long luxury yacht had been moored off Porticello, east of Palermo when violent winds and rains swept suddenly up the coast before dawn.

Lynch's wife Angela Bacares was among 15 people rescued but the businessman and his daughter Hannah Lynch were missing, Salvo Cocina, head of the Civil Protection Agency in Sicily, told AFP.

Bacares suffered light injuries and was spotted by AFP being wheeled into a hospital in Termini Imerese.

Lynch, 59, is a celebrated technology sector entrepreneur and investor, sometimes referred to as the UK's answer to Bill Gates.

Divers who recovered a first body in the area earlier on Monday had seen one of the missing six trapped inside the sunken vessel, according to a source close to the recovery operation.

"It was terrible. The boat was hit by really strong wind and shortly after it went down," a British survivor named as Charlotte Golunski told ANSA news agency.

The Bayesian, flying the British flag, had 22 people aboard, including 10 crew members, the coast guard said.

Most of those aboard were British, and the passengers were guests of Lynch, according to Italian media.

'Screaming'

Golunski said her one-year-old daughter, named by media as Sophia, had nearly drowned.

"For two seconds I lost her in the sea, then I grabbed her again. I held her tightly to me, while the sea raged. Lots of people were screaming," she was quoted as saying.

She managed to climb aboard a life raft, she said.

The yacht was anchored some 700 metres from the Porticello port when it was struck by a waterspout, which roughly resembles a mini tornado over a body of water.

Karsten Borner, the captain of another yacht anchored nearby at the time of the storm, said there was a "very strong hurricane gust" and he had to battle to keep his vessel steady.

All of a sudden "we noticed that the ship behind us was gone", he told journalists in Porticello.

"We found this life raft... with a little baby, and the wife of the owner," he said.

Fisherman Fabio Cefalu said he and other fishermen rushed to help after seeing a distress flare go up.

"But we didn't find anyone in the sea, we only found cushions and the remains of the boat," he told AFP.

A waterspout is a column that descends from a cloud to form a rotating mixture of wind and water over a body of water, often during severe thunderstorms, according to National Geographic.

Just a few hours later, the seas were calm as emergency services carried a body bag to shore.

Survivors included two people with joint French and British nationalities, a Sri Lankan, a New Zealander and an Irish national, according to media reports.

'No longer there'

Camper & Nicholsons, the managers of the yacht, said in a statement that they were "assisting with the ongoing search" for the missing people.

Italian authorities have opened a probe into the incident.

The incident comes after Mike Lynch was acquitted on all charges in a San Francisco court in early June after he was accused of massive fraud linked to the sale of his software firm Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard.

The Bayesian was a luxury superyacht built by the Italian shipbuilding firm Perini Navi in 2008.

According to the Boat International website, it had an 11.51-metre mast and could reach speeds of up to 15.5 knots.

"The boat was all lit up. Around 4:30 am, it was no longer there," said one witness cited by ANSA.

"A beautiful boat where there was a party. A normal joyous vacation day at sea turned into tragedy".