LONDON and ROME — Two bodies have been recovered from the superyacht that sunk off the Sicilian coast, according to the Italian coast guard. Four other passengers are still missing.
The bodies, which have been brought to the surface, have not yet been identified.
Rescue teams are facing a “very hard” operation to find those still missing after the superyacht sunk on Monday, a spokesperson for the onsite fire brigade teams told ABC News.
Luca Cari said the rescue operation for the people still missing from the U.K.-flagged Bayesian was ongoing Wednesday. The vessel was lost early on Monday in stormy weather around half a mile from the fishing village of Porticello, close to the city of Palermo.
Fifteen people have so far been rescued and one body was previously recovered.
“For us, it remains a rescue operation,” Cari told ABC News Wednesday morning, prior to the recovery of the two bodies, when asked if emergency services were transitioning to a recovery operation.
Italian Firefighters scuba divers bring ashore in a green bag the body of one of the victims of the UK flag vessel Bayesian, Wednesday, Aug. 21, 2024. The sail yacht was hit by a violent sudden storm and sunk early Monday, while at anchor off the Sicilian village of Porticello near Palermo, in southern Italy.
Salvatore Cavalli/AP
Asked if there was any hope that the missing may be surviving thanks to air pockets inside the sunk vessel, Cari responded: “One can never exclude anything but it seems rather improbable.”
Cari said that 12 of the 18 divers leading rescue efforts on Wednesday are specialized divers who have extensive experience working inside caves.
Divers have been operating inside the yacht for two days, he added. “But the job is very hard because there are large obstacles and [we] have to work in very narrow spaces.”
“It’s a long process and we can only operate in short spells,” Cari added. Divers have to be rotated constantly, with each only able to stay underwater for around 12 minutes, he said.
Two Americans — Christopher and Neda Morvillo — are among the six people still missing, ABC News confirmed on Tuesday.
Divers of the Vigili del Fuoco, the Italian Corps. of Firefighters, get ready in Porticello near Palermo, on August 21, 2024 two days after the British-flagged luxury yacht Bayesian sank. Rescuers with divers and an underwater drone search for six people believed trapped when the boat sank. Among the six missing were UK tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah, and Jonathan Bloomer, the chair of Morgan Stanley International, and his wife Judy.
Alberto Pizzoli/AFP via Getty Images
Christopher Morvillo is a partner at law firm Clifford Chance and represented the yacht’s owner — British tech tycoon Mike Lynch — in his recent fraud case brought by Hewlett Packard. He is a former assistant United States attorney for the Southern District of New York.
Morgan Stanley International Chairman Jonathan Bloomer and his wife Anne Elizabeth Judith Bloomer are also among the six missing passengers.
Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah are believed to also be among the missing.
ABC News’ Joe Simonetti contributed to this report.