A diver has died during preliminary operations to recover British tech tycoon Mike Lynch's superyacht from the waters off the coast of northern Sicily, local police have said.
The 56-metre-long Bayesian was moored off the small port of Porticello, near Palermo, in August last year when it was likely hit by a downburst — a very strong downward wind — killing seven people, including Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah.
Police said Friday's accident happened while the diver was underwater in Porticello, adding the precise cause of death was still unknown.
Italian news agencies reported the diver was a 39-year-old Dutch national who worked for the Dutch specialist salvage company Hebo Maritiemservice.
The attempt to lift the yacht off the seabed is expected later this month and should help shed light on how a supposedly unsinkable vessel disappeared into the sea.
There were 12 passengers — including Morgan Stanley International's chairman Jonathan Bloomer and US lawyer Chris Morvillo, who were later confirmed dead — and 10 crew members aboard Lynch's luxury yacht.
Lynch's body was recovered by the Italian coastguard from the wreckage of the yacht three days after the incident occurred.
Who's Mike Lynch?
Lynch — known as 'Britain's Bill Gates' — battled for nearly a decade to beat accusations he had built his tech fortune on a fraudulent deal.
The 59-year-old Cambridge-educated mathematician created Autonomy, a search engine that could pore through emails and other internal business documents to help companies find vital information more quickly.
When Lynch sold his company Autonomy to Hewlett Packard (HP), the deal was worth $16.4 billion in 2011 and rocketed him up the rich list.
However, the deal quickly turned sour after he was accused of forging the software's financial records to make the sale.
The British tycoon eventually walked free of the criminal charges in June 2024.
ABC/Reuters
