Super yacht sinking - did the crew bravely survive or did they abandon their the passengers

[mids2019]

So....most of the crew survived this tragedy but the passengers died. Do you think it will emerge the crew should have e done more to alrt the passengers and indeed put their lives in danger to attempt a rescue? Maybe it was all just too fast?

I just think there seems silence from the crew at moment despite being survivors of a sinking vessel who have a story to tell. Are lawyers advising they stay quiet on this?

Actually, apologies, I have just realised who posted that and she asked me not to interact with her,

Never mind.

Sailing forums. People in Croatia got that storm warning.

And did they all batten down the hatches and get everyone out of bed?
It’s not so helpful if it’s really unspecific….

No, they didn't leave the shore.

I think the point to batten down the hatches was well before the storm proper hit, and to check they were secure as or before it hit, and the time to get everyone out of bed was at approx 3.50 when the anchor broke.

Apparently there was a maritime weather warning several days prior. The Croatian sailors said they spent the whole day prepping for the storm. The whole area was prepping, they said. And that's Croatia.

Nobody was out within a 1000 km radius?

Yep.

I’m sorry to be tedious and drag this back to the one comparable industry which is aviation but in that field to a professional a vague warning of “storm” or “weather warning” is meaningless…even the term “Thunderstorm” doesn’t mean that much by itself.

In flying you be talking about a “sigmet” for an area or an airport, and/or the specific Terminal Aerodrome Forecast (TAF) for the airport…and you can usually go back and look at archived forecasts and TAFs.

I’m assuming somewhere, archived, there is a maritime equivalent for that part of Italian waters and that it may contain at least some detail beyond forecast of a “storm”.

Isn’t it possible that Croatia had a storm and that it wasn’t the same storm?

Fuck me. The storm was forecast, and surrounding boats were prepared. Sailors discussing the Bayesian disaster have referred to the same forecast storm, and their preparations. It was clearly a serious storm. I'm sure this will all come out in the findings of the investigation in a few years.

Fuck me. The storm was forecast,

Um ok…some of us are just curious as to what was in the actual text of the forecast and at a more basic level how maritime forecasts are formatted and promulgated..

For example was it something like:
“thunderstorms with rain, winds 30 gusting 40 knots” or “heavy thunderstorms with hail, wind 60 gusting 100”?

I have no idea what the actual warning was, and no experience in interpreting maritime weather warnings. It was a sufficient warning that the local fishermen stayed in port that night.

Considering all the local fishermen locked down their vessels and wouldn't go out should give you an inkling that it wasn't a typical storm. Fishermen go out in all kinds of weather or they don't eat, they aren't wimps or scardy cats, they are tough. Other boats/yachts managed to hear about it, they managed to go into harbour or lock down their vessels, so why not this one.

Yep I get and understand all the above, I’m still vaguely curious to know what sort of actual hard, forecast, info any of the yacht captains in the area were actually working on but I’m beginning to wish I hadn’t asked…

Yes. Never mind.

I can't speak for a captain but if I was crew I was saving myself. Don't get paid enough for anything else.

This was the reason why I didn't volunteer to be a fire warden at a previous place of work. It would be your job to check that everyone was out and you'd be last to leave. All for the grand some of £10 a month. No thanks.

It must be the case that certain kinds of boats are better able to weather certain severities of storm.

And that there is a difference between taking your smaller boat out in a storm to fish etc vs anchoring your larger boat in what may usually be calm waters.

Given there was a boat (the Baden Powell) anchored close to the Bayesian, it clearly wasn’t unique for a boat to be at anchor, near shore but not in harbour.

So… I would be surprised (but let’s see in due course) if the storm warnings were so clear that this course of action was “automatically” reckless.

This is partly supported by the description of the exact weather that took down the yacht as a probable downburst, which I think is not common in a regular storm at sea - though I may be wrong.

The Inquiry will be able to answer that. Not MN

Im not sure how you got that I was suggesting they didn't got the weather warning from what I wrote.

I was asking if there are any parameters, as such, for the protocol that the manufacturer mentioned.

from a coastguard the day after the sinking:

“The wind was very strong. Bad weather was expected, but not of this magnitude,” a coast guard official in the Sicilian capital Palermo said the next day.

Source: www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/mike-lynch-yacht-tech-billionaire-us-trial-b2601488.html?utm_source=taboola&utm_medium=related&utm_campaign=embed1

Also from the independent (live feed, 2h ago)

The coast guard have also said that given the weather forecast, there was nothing wrong about the Bayesian being moored offshore rather than at sheltering at port. Another yacht anchored nearby emerged from the storm unharmed.

But the yacht was far from the only one who stayed anchored in that area, with occupants onboard.

Would you mind linking the info. about the yacht breaking anchor.

I was on a boat (fishing boat) in a storm and we were headed from an island to the mainland. We were sailing away from a storm that had been forecast but not as bad as it was. We had golf ball sixes hailstones (in the med and they bloody hurt!)
As we approached the harbour another unpredicted squall and stone passed between us and the harbour. We had to turn around.

So I totally believe that you can get caught out even trying to get to safety with unpredictable weather.

This was 1999!

Yeah the survivors were rescued by people from a nearby yacht.

The Daily Record’s report (of the Corriere’s report, so not ideal as not direct from the data) is:

It shows that at 3.50am on Monday the Bayesian began to shake "dangerously" during a fierce storm, Italian outlet Corriere reports. Just minutes later at 3.59am the boat's anchor gave way, with a source saying the data showed there was "no anchor left to hold".

After the ferocious weather ripped away the boat's mooring it was dragged some 358 metres through the water. By 4am it had started to take on water and was plunged into a blackout, indicating that the waves had reached its generator or even engine room. At 4.05am the Bayesian fully disappeared underneath the waves.

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/black-box-recovered-superyacht-wreckage-33531920?int_source=amp_continue_reading&int_medium=amp&int_campaign=continue_reading_button#amp-readmore-target

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This indicates more like 6 minutes. I am not sure how much credence I would give to times, until the investigators issue a definitive minute by minute timeline in due course