Bayesian crew unaware wind speeds of over 73mph could topple yacht, report finds

16 minutes ago Share Save Joe Inwood BBC World correspondent Jemma Crew BBC News Share Save

EPA The Bayesian, pictured sailing near Palermo, in a photo released by manufactures Perini Navi

The owner and crew of a luxury superyacht that sank off the coast of Sicily, killing tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch and six others, were unaware wind speeds of over 73mph could tip it over, according to an interim report. Modelling commissioned after the disaster indicates gusts of that speed hitting the side of the Bayesian, when it had its sails down and centreboard up, would "likely result" in its capsize. The UK's Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB), leading the international investigation, said winds of over 80mph "violently" hit the vessel, causing it to flood within seconds. It sank near the town Porticello on 19 August last year during freak weather, with reports of water spouts.

Seven of the 22 people onboard were killed, including Mr Lynch, 59, and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah. Investigators say the yacht was knocked to a 90-degree angle within 15 seconds at 04:06 am local time, causing people, furniture and loose items to fall across the deck. "There was no indication of flooding inside Bayesian until water came in over the starboard rails and, within seconds, entered the internal spaces down the stairwells," the report says. The MAIB's chief inspector of marine accidents Andrew Moll said the situation was "irrecoverable" once the yacht tilted beyond 70 degrees. The yacht had its sails down and centreboard up when it sank. The MAIB commissioned modelling from the University of Southampton to examine the stability of the yacht in these conditions. It indicated that - if the wind was blowing directly across the beam, or side, of the boat - wind speeds in excess of 73mph were sufficient to tip the boat over and "it is possible" the yacht was similarly vulnerable to lower wind speeds, the MAIB said. But this information was not included in the onboard stability information book and "consequently, these vulnerabilities were also unknown to either the owner or the crew of Bayesian", the report found. The MAIB is investigating the incident as the Bayesian was registered in the UK. No date has been set for when its final report will be published. It said its report was based on "a limited amount of verified evidence" as a criminal investigation by Italian authorities has restricted access to the wreck. An operation to raise the 56-metre vessel from the seabed was paused over the weekend after a diver died while working on the wreck. Work was set to resume on Thursday.

The report lays out more detail as to how the sinking unfolded. Investigators say the yacht sailed to the site where it sank on the previous day, in order to "shelter" from forecast thunderstorms. The sails were furled at the time. Wind speed was "no more than eight knots (9mph)" at 03:00 - about an hour before the incident. Some 55 minutes later it had increased to 30 knots (34.5mph), and it had accelerated to 70 knots (80.6mph) by 04:06 when the yacht capsized. As the storm intensified, several crew members were working in response to the conditions. The deck hand went onto the deck to close the yacht's windows. Five people were injured "either by falling or from things falling on them" and the deck hand was "thrown into the sea", the report says. Two of the yacht's guests used furniture drawers "as an improvised ladder" to escape their cabin, it adds.

EPA The recovery process is expected to take several weeks

Dr Simon Boxall, Oceanographer at the University of Southampton, said the Bayesian was in "the wrong place at the wrong time". "The priorities for the crew would have been to shut the hatches and the doors, which they did," he told the BBC. This means speculation about water flooding in because everything was open is "obviously not the case". "The next priority would have been to start the engines - so they would have some manoeuvrability to position themselves within a storm - and to then lift anchor, which the crew did, but this takes time," he added. "It's not like a car where you jump in and turn the key. It would take 5 or 10 minutes before you can start the engines with a vessel of this size." Survivors escaped on the Bayesian's life raft and were rescued by a small boat dispatched from another nearby yacht, the report says.

Getty Images Mike Lynch pictured in 2014

"She's sick!" United captain Maya Le Tissier says at the sound of Tullis-Joyce's name.

The centre-back says having Tullis-Joyce in goal gives her confidence and she has already become a leader within the squad.

"She's an amazing person. An unbelievable goalkeeper. We lost Mary in the summer but Phallon had been training the whole of the previous season," said Le Tissier.

"We knew she was going to be ready and she knew what it was going to take."

Alongside departing coach Ian Willcock and the rest of the goalkeeping group, Tullis-Joyce said she spent last year as back-up "watching" and "building chemistry" with her team-mates.

Away from the pitch, whenever her schedule allows, the 28-year-old spends time on her other hobbies - scuba diving, photography and collecting fossils.

Pursuing those passions has taken her around the world - from Costa Rica to Egypt to Norway.

"It's helped me tremendously just to have something that's completely and utterly separate from my career on the field," she said.

"I even took up free diving [which involves holding your breath and travelling as far as you can underwater without the use of breathing equipment] as well.

"That helped me understand my body's physiological responses to stress. I am able to sense my stress a little bit faster."

Growing up in Long Island, New York, she fell in love with the ocean and went on to study marine biology at the University of Miami - something she is planning on returning to when she hangs up her gloves.

"My plan post career is to go right back into the ocean and hopefully help with expanding marine protected areas to make sure that we take care of all the animals that we live with on this beautiful planet," she says.

In the meantime it is local Manchester students who have benefited from her expertise as she has spent time teaching them about marine conservation as part of a club initiative.

US and Iran close to nuclear deal, Trump says

The US has insisted that Iran must scrap its uranium enrichment to prevent the country developing nuclear weapons - though Iran insists its nuclear activities are entirely peaceful.

Earlier, an adviser to Iran's supreme leader told NBC News that Tehran was willing to make concessions on its nuclear programme in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.

Trump described the latest talks between the two countries, which ended on Sunday, as "very serious negotiations" for "long-term peace".

US President Donald Trump says that Iran has "sort of" agreed to the terms of a nuclear deal with the United States.

Speaking on Thursday in Qatar, on the second stop of his multi-day Gulf tour, Trump said that a deal was close on Iran's nuclear programme and suggested a military strike on Tehran's sites could be avoided.

"We're not going to be making any nuclear dust in Iran," Trump said after a meeting in Doha with business leaders.

"I think we're getting close to maybe doing a deal without having to do this.

"You probably read today the story about Iran. It's sort of agreed to the terms."

The president did not specify which remarks he was referring to, but an adviser to Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Ali Shamkhani, said in a US media interview that Tehran was willing to accept far-reaching curbs on its nuclear programme.

Shamkhani told ABC News that Iran would give up stockpiles of highly enriched uranium as part of a deal in which the US lifts sanctions.

The latest talks over Tehran's nuclear programme finished on Sunday, with both sides agreeing to meet again.

US Middle East Envoy Steve Witkoff said they were encouraging, while Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi described them as "difficult but useful".

Trump pulled out of a previous nuclear agreement between Iran and five other world powers in 2018.

He previously warned of possible military action against Iran's nuclear facilities if the fresh set of talks, which began in April, did not succeed.

A senior US official said the latest discussions lasted more than three hours, adding: "Agreement was reached to move forward with the talks to continue working through technical elements.

"We are encouraged by today's outcome and look forward to our next meeting, which will happen in the near future."

UK to start talks on return hubs for failed asylum seekers

Just now Share Save Ben Hatton BBC News Share Save

PA Media

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has said the UK is starting talks to set up overseas "return hubs" to house failed asylum seekers. In his first official visit to Albania, the prime minister said the government would begin discussions about sending asylum seekers abroad for processing after their claims had been rejected in the UK. Sir Keir has travelled to Albania to announce further measures to crack down on organised crime and illegal immigration. The number of people crossing the Channel has passed 12,000 since January, putting 2025 on course to be a record year.

Speaking to GB News, Sir Keir said: "What now we want to do and are having discussions of, talks of, is return hubs, which is where someone has been through the system in the UK, they need to be returned." The government would not comment on which countries would be involved in the talks. But the BBC has previously reported that the proposals are focused on countries in the western Balkans – a region which includes Albania, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. The proposals would apply only to asylum seekers whose claims had been rejected and who had no further routes of appeal in the UK. Italy has a similar scheme, which involves sending failed asylum seekers to Albania while they await deportation, but that plan has been held up by legal action. Sir Keir told GB News the return hubs would not be a "silver bullet" for halting small boats crossing the English Channel. But he said the combination of return hubs and other efforts to tackle people smuggling gangs would "allow us to bear down on this vile trade and make sure that we stop those people crossing the Channel".

'I'm overjoyed to be back': Syrians face daunting rebuild after years of war

21 minutes ago Share Save Tim Whewell BBC News Reporting from Homs, Syria Share Save

BBC

To the blast of a trumpet and the beating of drums, Fatima Hazzouri has come home. Thirteen years after civil war forced her to leave, she's back in her native city, Homs in Syria, blinking in the sunshine as she steps off a bus crammed with returning women and children, part of a long convoy of coaches and trucks. In a central square, they're greeted ecstatically by musicians and dancers in embroidered silk shirts.

More than 100 displaced families spent more than eight hours on the road to return to Homs from the north

Buses bringing familes back to Homs were greeted by musicians and dancers

Fatima is one of the seven million Syrians who were displaced within their country by the conflict between the government of former President Bashar al-Assad and rebel forces. It began in 2011 and finally ended with a rebel victory in December 2024. A further six million people fled abroad in those years. In total, more than half the population was forced to move. Bringing them back is perhaps the biggest challenge Syria now faces - because many no longer have a home to return to. But now, following President Donald Trump's decision to lift US sanctions on Syria, there's suddenly new hope that the shattered country can be rebuilt.

Fatima Hazzouri has returned to Homs after 13 years

"I'm overjoyed to be back," Fatima says. She shrieks in delight. The 124 families returning in the convoy have come from the north of Syria, where millions of displaced people live in tents and makeshift shelters. They've been on the road for eight exhausting hours - but it won't be an easy homecoming. Homs, Syria's third largest city, saw some of the fiercest fighting of the war. Whole districts are still in ruins. In 2012, two rockets fired by government forces slammed into Fatima's house, largely destroying it. Fatima jostles to get free food and clothing provided by the private Dubai-based charity Waqf al-Farah, which organised the convoy. Then she heads for the flat her family is renting until they can repair their old home. Like the other men in the convoy, her son-in-law Abdulrazaq has gone ahead, riding on top of the family's possessions piled high on a truck. When Fatima arrives, mattresses, carpets, pots and pans are already being hauled through an upstairs window.

At Fatima's family's house only two rooms are habitable. She says building a new roof and tiling the floors will cost thousands of dollars

In the north, Fatima got occasional work picking grapes or olives. Abdulrazaq was a teacher. But he doesn't know whether he'll get work in Homs to help pay the rent for the flat. "I don't know what our future will be," he says. "We'll wait for the new government to decide." "The biggest problem we have is lack of jobs," says Khalifa al-Hakmi, who helped organise the convoy. "People have nothing to do when they come back." Providing work is just part of the huge task faced by Syria's new rulers, the former Islamist rebel group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), as they try to rebuild the country. Three million homes were destroyed. Essential services are lacking in many places. Homs, like most parts of Syria, gets only a few hours of electricity a day. So far neither the government nor international agencies have put forward any comprehensive plan for resettling refugees. But the end of the crippling sanctions originally imposed on Syria by the US under the Assad regime means the country can again become part of the international banking system – and the economy can start to revive.

Carpenter Yasir al-Nagdali has replaced the windows and ceiling in the house he shares with his mother and pet bird

For now, though, returnees still have to fend for themselves. Yasir al-Nagdali and his mother Siham returned to Homs three years ago. Their house was a shell. But now they've replaced the windows and the ceiling and Yasir - a trained carpenter - has made their flat homely again. There's even a canary in a cage. Keeping birds is Yasir's hobby. He can't forget how they escaped at the height of the battle for Homs. They crawled on their hands and knees as regime soldiers raked their street with machine-gun fire. But Siham also remembers happier times in the house – such as when she got married at the age of 14. In those days, she says, there were belly-dancers at weddings – and she wore 12 different dresses, singing a song each time she changed.

For others in Homs, there's no happy return. Artist Samira Madwar sees no prospect of repairing the flat she grew up in. It was shelled, then burned, and looted by government forces. Samira now lives on the outskirts of the city. She bursts into tears when she sees the state of her beloved old home. Amid the rubble and broken plaster littering the floor, she finds old family photographs – and the remains of a book she wrote, that falls apart when she picks up. "In my brain, there is a hole," she says. "My paintings, my books – everything - they took it, and left us without a memory about our life." Despite everything, Samira stayed in Syria throughout the war. But many of her friends left the country. One was Ammar Azzouz. He trained as an architect in Homs and now researches at the University of Oxford in the UK. He's overwhelmed with emotions after coming back to his city for the first time since 2011. "I was aching for this day when I can walk the streets, touch the stones, meet the people, look at their faces, struggling to understand the scale of loss and grief," he says. But like many other Syrians who've successfully started new lives abroad, he's thinking of dividing his time between his native and adopted countries, rather than returning permanently. "Many people are describing it as the honeymoon period," Ammar says, talking about the first months after the fall of Assad. "There's a new energy and excitement and hope and optimism. At the same time, the reality is harsh. But I think building bridges between those who are outside and inside would be fascinating, because they bring in new skills, opportunities, networks and knowledge that we need so much."

For some returning to Homs there is no prospect of repairing their homes

Times reporter who exposed grooming gangs dies

1 hour ago Share Save Paul Glynn Culture reporter Share Save

The Times

Andrew Norfolk, the former Times journalist who exposed the Rotherham grooming gang scandal, has died aged 60. Norfolk, an award-winning reporter, died on 8 May after suffering ill health, the newspaper announced on Thursday. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer led the tributes saying Norfolk had been "absolutely integral" in helping to change the law so more grooming gang members could be convicted. His reporting in 2011 revealed a pattern of mainly white teenage girls being groomed by gangs of men of Pakistani heritage after a growing number of prosecutions across the country.

It led to an inquiry into child sexual exploitation in the south Yorkshire town dating from 1997 to 2013. It was estimated that around 1,400 children were sexually exploited over a 16 year period.

'Protect the most vulnerable'

Sir Keir, who was director of public prosecutions at the time, told The Times he was "deeply sorry" to hear of Norfolk's death. "He wasn't just an incredibly talented reporter, at The Times and elsewhere, he was driven by the desire to call our attention to injustice and protect the most vulnerable," the prime minister said. "His passion for supporting the victims of grooming gangs shone through, and he was absolutely integral to making sure we could change the rules to increase convictions of the vile perpetrators." The prime minister said he hoped "the difference he made to people's lives are a comfort" to his family and loved ones. Tony Gallagher, the editor of The Times, said Norfolk was "without doubt, one of the greatest investigative reporters of our or any age. "His tireless work exposing the evils of the predominantly Asian grooming gangs in and around towns in the north of England led to long overdue acknowledgement of the crimes, after the people who had been in a position to put a stop to it for years chose to look the other way."

Alamy Norfolk (seen with then-cabinet minister Theresa May) pictured winning reporter of the year at the Political and Public Life Awards in 2013

'Terrific journalist'

Captain Rachel Corsie returns for Scotland for the first time since July following injury as head coach Melissa Andreatta names her first squad as head coach.

The Scots round off Nations League Group A1 at home to Austria on 30 May before travelling to the Netherlands four days later.

There is also a first call up for Hibernian striker Kathleen McGovern, who has 25 goals for the Scottish Women's Premier League leaders, while Rangers captain Nicola Docherty and two club-mates - winger Brogan Hay and forward Kirsty Howat - are recalled.

Centre-half Corsie, who is leaving Aston Villa this summer, told BBC Scotland's Behind the Goals podcast on Tuesday she hoped to be involved with the national squad again after returning to action as a substitute as the Women's Super League club completed their season with a 3-1 win over Brighton & Hove Albion.

The 35-year-old, who has 154 caps, had been national captain prior to her long-term absence, which included a period out recovering from knee surgery.