Update: Salvage of sunken 56m sailing yacht Bayesian postponed

The recovery of the 56-metre Perini Navi sailing yacht Bayesian has been postponed, with the process unlikely to begin until April 2025. Work was expected to begin this month but the "complexity of operations" has caused delay, according to local Italian media.

Plans for the salvage officially began in December 2024, when a syndicate of insurers led by British Marine – which insures Bayesian, owned by the Lynch family – presented eight possible plans to the prosecutor's office in Termini Imerese, Sicily. According to local media, this included turning the vessel onto its keel and resurfacing it using cranes or "innovative buoyancy systems". The salvage poses significant logistical challenges for the parties involved, as the integrity of the yacht's structure is crucial to the ongoing investigation led by prosecutor Raffaele Cammarano.

The Italian Coast Guard will also have to approve the salvage proposal. Once resurfaced, Bayesian will likely be transported to Palermo for forensic examination.

On 19 August 2024, Bayesian was hit by bad weather and sunk approximately 0.8 nautical miles off the coast of Porticello in Sicily, Italy. It is understood that the yacht was being used to celebrate Lynch's recent victory in a 13-year £8 billion fraud acquittal. Of the 22 persons on board, 15 were safely evacuated, with a search and rescue mission later recovering the bodies of seven people.

A manslaughter and homicide probe is underway in Italy, while in the UK, an inquest into the deaths of four victims of the Bayesian disaster has officially opened at The Coroner's Court in Ipswich. The cause of death for Michael Lynch has been attributed to "drowning", but the deaths of the other three parties are still under investigation.

As Superintendent Mike Brown of Suffolk Police confirmed that the court was reliant on both the Italian authorities and the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) for "further evidential material", there is concern that the inquest itself – also scheduled to resume in April 2025 – may be impacted by the salvage's delay.

This update follows the announcement that The Italian Sea Group (TISG), which owns the Perini Navi brand, would be taking legal action against the New York Times (NYT) in response to an article that the shipbuilder believes could cause reputational damages.