- Powell 'not concerned' US Fed would lose independence under Trump
- French government falls in historic no-confidence vote
- Syrian White Helmets chief 'dreams' of never pulling a body out of rubble again
- NBA Suns lose Durant for at least a week with ankle injury
- Warhammer maker Games Workshop enters London's top stocks index
- Iran Nobel winner released for three weeks, 'unconditional' freedom urged
- Red Cross marks record numbers of humanitarians killed in 2024
- Johnson's Grand Slam 'no threat', says World Athletics boss Coe
- Qatar's emir and UK's Starmer talk trade as state visit ends
- Cuba suffers third nationwide blackout in two months
- Russia, Ukraine to send top diplomats to OSCE summit in Malta
- Spanish royals to attend memorial service for flood victims
- LPGA, USGA new policy requires female at birth or pre-puberty change
- Stick to current climate change laws, US tells top UN court
- British Museum chief says Marbles deal with Greece 'some distance' away
- Pope Francis receives electric popemobile from Mercedes
- Gaza civil defence: thousands flee Israeli strikes, evacuation calls
- Trump names billionaire private astronaut as next NASA chief
- Pidcock to leave INEOS Grenadiers at end of season
- Seoul stocks weaken, Paris advances despite political turmoil
- South America summit hopes to seal 'historic' trade deal with EU
- DAZN awarded global TV rights for Club World Cup
- Top executive shot dead outside New York hotel
- Vaping while still smoking unlikely to help quitters: study
- British Museum chief says Parthenon Marbles deal with Greece 'some distance' away
- 'Creating connections': Arab, African filmmakers gather at Morocco workshops
- Iran frees Nobel winner for three weeks, sparking calls for 'permanent' release
- Brazil's Minas cheese gets added to UNESCO list
- Top US executive shot dead in New York City: media
- Trump's nominee to run Pentagon hangs by a thread
- GM announces more than $5 bn hit to earnings in China venture
- World chess champ Ding, teen challenger tied past halfway mark
- Georgia police raid opposition offices as PM vows to curb protests
- S. Korea opposition begins push to impeach president
- Syrian army fights rebel offensive with counterattack
- France court upholds Polanski acquittal in defamation case
- UK bans daytime TV ads for cereals, muffins and burgers
- Palace's Guehi to face no formal action over 'Jesus' message on rainbow armband
- UK faces trade balancing act with Trump, EU
- Iran releases Nobel Peace laureate Mohammadi on medical leave: lawyer
- UNESCO grants heritage status to Aleppo soap as Syria war flares
- Ghana's illegal mining boom seeps into presidential election
- Inconsistent Spurs 'progressing in all aspects': Postecoglou
- France's Orano says Niger junta controls uranium firm
- Seoul stocks weaken, Paris edges up tracking political turmoil
- China reports warmest autumn since records began
- French marine park to close over law banning killer whale shows
- Thousands march demanding S. Korea president resign over martial law debacle
- Taiwan romance novelist Chiung Yao dies at 86
- In Angola, Biden promises to invest differently to China
RBGPF | -1.64% | 61 | $ | |
RELX | 0.85% | 47.888 | $ | |
VOD | -0.35% | 8.799 | $ | |
CMSC | 0% | 24.56 | $ | |
GSK | -1.12% | 34.515 | $ | |
RIO | -0.2% | 63.385 | $ | |
AZN | -1.89% | 66.79 | $ | |
NGG | -1.25% | 62.19 | $ | |
BTI | 0.13% | 37.08 | $ | |
JRI | -0.74% | 13.44 | $ | |
CMSD | -0.04% | 24.3 | $ | |
BP | -1.15% | 29.115 | $ | |
SCS | -0.67% | 13.43 | $ | |
RYCEF | 1.59% | 7.56 | $ | |
BCE | -2.19% | 26.725 | $ | |
BCC | -0.36% | 145.91 | $ |
Divers searching sunken yacht for UK tycoon's daughter find body
Divers searching for the last person missing after a superyacht sank off Sicily found a body Friday, presumed to be the teenage daughter of UK tech tycoon Mike Lynch, who also perished.
The discovery, confirmed to AFP by the Italian coastguard, brings to seven the final death toll in the sinking of the "Bayesian", which went down off the Italian island before dawn on Monday.
The bodies of Lynch, a celebrated tech entrepreneur and investor, and four other passengers were found on Wednesday and Thursday, with his 18-year-old daughter Hannah the only one still missing.
Emergency services had found the body of another man, believed to be the yacht's chef, a few hours after it sank in a sudden storm.
Lynch had invited friends and family onto the sailing boat to celebrate his recent acquittal in a massive US fraud case.
But as the 56-metre (185-feet) British-flagged yacht was anchored off Porticello, near Palermo, it was struck by a waterspout -- akin to a mini-tornado.
It sank within minutes.
Italian authorities launched what they called a "delicate" search operation involving specialist divers, boats from several emergency services and helicopters.
- 'Heartbroken' -
Fifteen people had been rescued from the ship, including Lynch's wife, who is believed to have been waiting in a Sicily hotel for news of her husband and daughter.
The 18-year-old Hannah had just finished her end of school exams and had a place to study English literature at Oxford University, according to UK media reports.
Friends of the teenager told The Times newspaper that she was kind and clever, as well as a staunch feminist.
The bodies of Lynch's lawyer Christopher Morvillo and his wife Neda, and Jonathan Bloomer, the chair of Morgan Stanley International, and his wife Judy, were recovered on Wednesday.
Morvillo's firm Clifford Chance paid tribute to the lawyer and his wife, saying all were "heartbroken at the tragic passing... and still coming to terms with this terrible loss".
The Bloomer family described their "unimaginable grief", saying Jonathan and Judy had been together for five decades.
"Our only comfort is that they are still together now," the family said.
The Lynch family has yet to comment publicly.
Many questions remain about why the yacht sank, and so quickly, when other boats nearby were unaffected.
On Thursday the head of the company which built the boat said the tragedy could have been avoided.
"Everything that was done reveals a very long summation of errors," said Giovanni Costantino, head of the Italian Sea Group, which includes the Perini Navi company that built Bayesian in 2008.
- Bad weather forecast -
He told Italy's Corriere della Sera newspaper that bad weather was forecast and all the passengers should have been gathered at a pre-arranged assembly point, with all the doors and hatches closed.
"Instead it took on water with the guests still in the cabin. They ended up in a trap, those poor people ended up like mice in a trap," he said.
Lynch, 59, was acquitted on all charges in a San Francisco court in June after he was accused of an $11 billion fraud linked to the sale of his software firm Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard.
The Bayesian, owned by his family, boasted a 75-metre mast, the tallest aluminium sailing mast in the world, according to the Charter World website.
Raising it would likely cost some 15 million euros and take "six to eight weeks", according to the salvage engineer who led the operation to recover the Costa Concordia cruise ship, which sank off Italy in 2012.
To recover the yacht, the mast could be removed on the seabed but the boat would be lifted up whole using a giant crane and a team of 40 specialist divers, South African engineer Nick Sloane told the Repubblica daily.
A.Gasser--BTB