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Thursday September 12, 2024

UK tycoon’s daughter is seventh, final victim of Sicily yacht sinking

By AFP
August 24, 2024
An undated handout picture shows UK tech tycoon Mike Lynch (late) and his daughter Hannah Lynch (late) posing in an unknown location. — AFP/file
An undated handout picture shows UK tech tycoon Mike Lynch (late) and his daughter Hannah Lynch (late) posing in an unknown location. — AFP/file 

PORTICELLO, Italy: Divers searching a sunken superyacht off Sicily recovered the body of the teenage daughter of UK tech tycoon Mike Lynch on Friday, the seventh and final victim of a tragedy in which the businessman also perished.

Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah had been among six passengers reported missing after the “Bayesian” went down off the north coast of the Italian island in a storm early on Monday morning.

After Hannah´s body was brought ashore on Friday, her family issued a statement describing their “unspeakable grief”.

“The Lynch family is devastated, in shock and is being comforted and supported by family and friends,” it said.

Search teams had recovered the bodies of four of Lynch´s friends on Wednesday, and that of the entrepreneur himself on Thursday.

The body of a man believed to be the yacht´s chef had been found a few hours after the sailing ship sank.

Lynch, 59, had invited friends and family onto the sailing boat to celebrate his recent acquittal in a massive US fraud case.

But the 56-metre British-flagged yacht was struck by a waterspout -- akin to a mini-tornado -- before dawn on Monday as it was anchored off Porticello, near Palermo.

It sank at around 04:30 am local time, according to management company Camper and Nicolsons, and now lies on the sea bed some 50 metres down.

Hannah had just finished her end-of-school exams and had a place to study English literature at Oxford University.