Search and rescue teams have made the grim discovery on the third day of the search for six missing passengers aboard the luxury Bayesian superyacht, which sank after being caught in a violent storm on Monday morning. Four bodies have been found in the underwater wreckage but have yet to be identified, while the search continues for two others who are still missing.
Those missing or presumed dead include British billionaire Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah; Morgan Stanley chairman Jonathan Bloomer and his wife Judy; and Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo and his wife Neda. The chartered trip was to celebrate Lynch's recent acquittal after a 13-year legal battle over fraud allegations stemming from the $11 billion sale of his software company to Hewlett-Packard in 2011.
Accordingly IndependentOne of the two bodies that were brought ashore on Wednesday was reported to belong to a “large-bodied man”, while the other two were reportedly found inside the yacht.
There were 22 people on the doomed ship when it sank, including 12 passengers and 10 crew members. Fifteen people were rescued shortly after the incident and the body of chef Recaldo Thomas was recovered from the wreckage on Monday.
Complex rescue efforts have been hampered by debris blocking access to cabins and crews have so far only been able to access public areas of the ship. Further complicating the operation is the Sicilian firefighting divers being restricted to 12-minute underwater shifts.
Bloomer's brother, Jeremy Bloomer, said there was hope that the victims still on the yacht could still be alive. “It's a slow process and it's going to take time,” he explained. “So there could be air pockets, but we don't know. We're still waiting and seeing, so we're keeping our fingers crossed.”
London-based solicitor Ayla Ronald, 36, a senior member of the Clifford Chance legal team and was among those rescued along with her partner Matthew Fletcher. Her father Lin Ronald said: New Zealand Herald She said her daughter was “very shaken” after the incident.
Ronald said his daughter only texted him to say “there are deaths, she and her partner are alive” and that he was the only person with a charged phone and was coordinating with paramedics.