Divers searching the wreck of a superyacht that sank off the Italian island of Sicily have recovered at least one body, as the search continues for more missing passengers and questions intensified about why the sailboat sank so quickly.
Divers and rescue crews unloaded a body bag from one of the rescue vessels that pulled into port at Porticello on Wednesday afternoon (late Wednesday AEST).
The discovery confirmed that the operation to search the wreckage on the seabed 50 metres underwater was a recovery one, not a rescue.
READ MORE: What might have caused Mike Lynch’s superyacht to sink
The Bayesian, a 56-metre British-flagged yacht, went down in a storm early on Monday as it was moored about a kilometre offshore.
Civil protection officials said they believed the ship was struck by a tornado over the water, known as a waterspout, and sank quickly.
Fifteen people escaped in a lifeboat and were rescued by a nearby sailboat. One body was recovered on Monday — that of the ship’s Antigua-born chef, Recaldo Thomas.
Six people remained unaccounted for, including British tech magnate Mike Lynch, his 18-year-old daughter and associates who had successfully defended him in a recent US federal fraud trial.
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