Bayesian yacht sinking: Body of UK tycoon's daughter found, says source

UK tech tycoon Mike Lynch's 18-year-old daughter, Hannah — who was the last person still unaccounted for after the family's luxury yacht sank this week — had been found, a source with knowledge of the situation said.

While initial reports said divers searching for the last missing person found a body, it was Reuters' source that confirmed the remains were Hannah's.

The body's discovery brings to seven the final death toll in the sinking of the luxury yacht 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.

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 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.

'Unimaginable grief'

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.

Why the yacht sank

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.