The timing of the recovery of the wreckage of a luxury yacht from the bottom of the sea is uncertain and depends on many factors, Italian officials have said. The Bayesian superyacht was moored around half a mile off the coast of Porticello when it sank at about 5am local time on Monday, killing seven people, after being struck by a powerful type of wind called a downburst. Maritime director of western Sicily, Rear Admiral Raffaele Macauda, said: “I can’t say how long it will take before we can recover the vessel.
” He was speaking during a press conference in Italy – where a shipwreck and manslaughter investigation was announced and details of how the authorities intend to proceed was outlined. The shipwreck is now “50 metres down” and there is no current retrieval timeframe, although some experts have estimated it could take eight weeks. The Rear Admiral, who stressed that recovering the fuel tanks is a “priority for us because it has environmental knock-on effects”, said: “We’re talking about a shipwreck at 50 metres down.
“Everything depends on the availability of the owners and the timeframe of the retrieval of the wreck and of course all that has to be submitted to the port authorities and in parallel of course there will be the inquiry results and it’s only really then that we will be able to authorise the operation. “I can’t say, like some experts who have already spoken on the subject, that it will be eight weeks. “There are specialised c.