ROME, Aug 21 — Six people are missing, including British tech tycoon Mike Lynch and a Morgan Stanley executive, one person is dead and there are 15 survivors following the sinking of a luxury yacht off the northern coast of Sicily. Here is what we know about the August 19 accident and what marine experts are saying about what might have happened. Violent storm The Bayesian, a British flagged 56-metre superyacht, sank in the dark shortly before 5am (0300 GMT/11am Malaysian time) off the port of Porticello, near Palermo, after being hit by a “violent storm,” the Italian coast guard said.
The coast guard said bad weather had been forecast, but added that it was more virulent than expected. Some locals spoke of a waterspout, or sea whirlwind, of exceptional force. “It was a strange thing,” fisherman Andrea Carini told Reuters.
The Bayesian was at anchor, its sails down, when the tempest hit, with another yacht moored nearby. The other boat The nearby yacht, the 42-metre Sir Robert Baden Powell, remained anchored and weathered the storm after its captain turned on the engine to keep control of the vessel and avoid a collision with the Bayesian. The captain, Karsten Borner, said he did not know if the crew of the Bayesian had managed to switch on its engines.
“I don’t think they did things wrong, I think they were surprised by the power of the storm,” he told Reuters. “I only know that they went flat with the mast on the water and that they sank in two minutes,”.