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British tech tycoon among those missing after superyacht sinks off Sicily

British tech tycoon Mike Lynch was one of six people who died at sea on Monday when a superyacht sank off the Italian island of Sicily during a sudden storm. The 56-metre (185-foot) luxury yacht was anchored off Porticello, east of Palermo, when sudden, fierce winds and pre-dawn rain swept up the coast. Lynch's wife Angela Bacares was among the 15 rescued, but the businessman and his daughter Hannah Lynch were missing, Salvo Cocina, head of the civil protection agency in Sicily, told AFP. Bacares suffered minor injuries and was spotted by AFP as she was being wheeled to a hospital in Termini Imerese. Lynch, 59, is a celebrated entrepreneur and investor in the technology sector who is sometimes described as Britain's answer to Bill Gates. Divers recovering a first body in the area earlier on Monday had seen one of the six missing people trapped inside the sunken vessel, a source close to the salvage operation said. “It was terrible. The boat was caught in a really strong wind and shortly after it went under,” a British survivor named Charlotte Golunski told the ANSA news agency. The British-flagged Bayesian had 22 people on board, including 10 crew members, according to the coast guard. Most of those on board were British, and the passengers were guests of Lynch, according to Italian media. – 'Screams' – Golunski said her one-year-old daughter, named Sophia by the media, almost drowned. “For two seconds I lost her in the sea, then I grabbed her again. I held her tightly to me while the sea was raging. Lots of people were screaming,” she was quoted as saying. She managed to climb aboard a life raft, she said. The yacht was anchored about 700 metres from Porticello harbour when it was hit by a waterspout, which is roughly similar to a mini-tornado over a body of water. Karsten Borner, the captain of another yacht anchored nearby at the time of the storm, said there was a “very strong hurricane gust” and he had to fight to keep his vessel stable. All of a sudden “we noticed that the ship behind us had gone,” he told journalists in Porticello. “We found this life raft… with a small baby and the owner's wife,” he said. Fisherman Fabio Cefalu said he and other fishermen rushed to help after seeing a distress flare rising. “But we didn't find anyone in the sea, we only found cushions and the remains of the boat,” he told AFP. A waterspout is a column that descends from a cloud and forms a rotating mixture of wind and water over a body of water, often during severe thunderstorms, according to National Geographic. Just hours later, the sea was calm as rescue workers brought a body bag ashore. Among the survivors, according to media reports, were two people of French and British nationality, a Sri Lankan, a New Zealander and an Irish citizen. – 'No longer there' – Camper & Nicholsons, the yacht's managers, said in a statement that they would “assist in the ongoing search” for the missing people. Italian authorities have launched an investigation into the incident. The incident came after Mike Lynch was acquitted of all charges by a San Francisco court in early June after being accused of massive fraud related to the sale of his software company Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard. The Bayesian was a luxury superyacht built in 2008 by Italian shipbuilding company Perini Navi. It had a mast 11.51 meters high and could reach speeds of up to 15.5 knots, according to the Boat International website. “The boat was completely lit up. At around 4:30 a.m. it was no longer there,” said a witness quoted by ANSA. “A beautiful boat on which a party was taking place. A normal, happy holiday at sea turned into a tragedy.”bur-ide/jm