A hero British mother who saved her baby daughter from drowning as the Bayesian superyacht sank during a freak storm survived because she was ‘sleeping on deck’ when it hit.
Charlotte Golunski was left holding her daughter Sophia ‘afloat with all her strength’ in the pitch-black water when the boat went down early on Monday morning after being struck by a waterspout.
The 35-year-old was left screaming for help as the storm raged around her, before being helped onto a liferaft where she and 14 other survivors took shelter while awaiting rescue.
The Oxford graduate was discharged from hospital yesterday alongside Sophia, and has been reunited with her husband who was not with her when the tragedy unfolded but also survived.
At least one person is known to have died in the tragedy, while six others including British tech tycoon Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter are still missing with fears they are dead in the wreck of the boat as search operations continue.
It comes as:
Ms Golunski works as a senior associate at Invoke Capital, a firm founded by Mr Lynch and had been invited on the trip as the British billionaire celebrated his ‘second life’ after being acquitted of fraud charges in the US.
Italian doctors claim that she had been sleeping with baby Sophia on the deck, while her husband James Emslie was on another part of the boat, when the ‘black swan’ waterspout hit at around 5am on Monday morning.
Dr Domenico Cipolla, the head of paediatric care at the Di Cristina Children’s Hospital in Palermo where Ms Golunski was taken in the aftermath of the disaster, shed new light on her experience.
He told Sky News: ‘She said that she was sleeping with the child on deck while her husband was a little further away in another part of the boat and she felt the oscillations of the ship.
‘In an instant it was dark and she found herself in the water in just a few minutes. She said she tried to hold on to the child but lost the child from her grip for three seconds.
‘She then managed to catch her in the water.’
Ms Golunski had previously told Italian newspaper Repubblica about the nightmare passengers found themselves plunged into and how she saved her daughter’s life.
She said: ‘I held her afloat with all my strength, my arms stretched upwards to keep her from drowning.
‘It was all dark. In the water I couldn’t keep my eyes open. I screamed for help but all I could hear around me was the screams of others.’
On Tuesday Ms Golunski and her daughter left hospital with Mr Emslie, Dr Cipolla revealing the pair had ‘hugged and comforted each other’ after being reunited but also ‘cried’ for those who did not make it.
A total of six people are still missing – Mr Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah, Morgan Stanley International bank chairman Jonathan Bloomer; his wife, Judy Bloomer; Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo; and his wife, Neda Morvillo.
The body of Canadian-Antiguan national Recaldo Thomas, who was working on the yacht as a cook, was found in the water shortly after search operations began on Monday.
The search operation to find them in the wreck of the boat has continued into a third day.
Efforts to access the boat, which is resting 164ft (50m) down on the seabed, have been hampered by furniture blocking the entrances – having to smash their way through a 3cm-thick porthole to get access – and the depth which means they can only spend 10 minutes at the bottom before having to come back up.
Those in charge of the operation say they believe the missing are in their cabins and despite suggestions that there could be survivors in air pockets, the chances of them still being alive two days on are incredibly slim at best.
It comes as Italian authorities have launched an investigation into whether hatches left open by crew members caused the boat to sink so rapidly.
Meteorological experts have said the waterspout – which brought tornado speed winds in a matter of seconds – was a ‘black swan event’ due to its extreme rarity and severe impact.
Survivors who were thrown into the water during the terrifying incident have described it going under the water in minutes, while CCTV footage shows the superyacht vanishing in moments.
One expert at the scene said an early focus of the official investigation into the tragedy, launched by prosecutors in nearby Termini Imerese, would be whether the yacht’s crew had closed access hatches into the vessel before the storm struck.
Investigators would look at whether appropriate measures had been taken, given the forecasts for bad weather overnight, and if any of the crew members are criminally liable.
Sailing expert Sam Jefferson, editor of magazine Sailing Today, also said that he believes open hatches and doors could have contributed to the rapid sinking of Mr Lynch’s superyacht.
He said: ‘I would have said that the boat got hit very hard by the wind, it was pinned over on its side.
‘I imagine all the doors were open because it was hot, so there were enough hatches and doors open that it filled with water very quickly and sank like that.’
Andrea Ratti, a nautical design professor at Milan Polytechnic University, said that a boat the size of the Bayesian would only sink so quickly by taking in a huge amount of water.
He suggested that portholes, windows or other openings may have been left open, letting in water.
Weather records show temperatures reached around 33C the day before the sinking, which may have led to the vessel’s occupants wanting air to flow through while they slept.
The Italian coastguard has insisted it is continuing its search, even though a positive outcome after nearly two days is ‘difficult to imagine’.
Frigate Captain Vincenzo Zagarola told Italian radio station RTL: ‘Given the time that has passed and the circumstances of the event, it is naturally difficult to imagine that things can go well but we are not giving up, so we are busy [searching] with naval and air resources.’
When Mr Zagarola was asked about the likelihood of the missing passengers being alive, he said: ‘Never say never, but reasonably the answer should be not.’
Among the survivors is Mr Lynch’s wife Angela Bacares, who is now reportedly recovering from her injuries in a wheelchair.
She revealed that the first sign of the freak waterspout that sunk the luxury sailboat Bayesian was a ‘slight tilt’ that woke her up.
Lynch’s wife told La Repubblica that she and her husband woke up at 4am when the boat suddenly ’tilted’.
Mrs Bacares said that they were not worried at the time, but that she still got up to see what was happening, until glass shattered and created confusion on board.
She sustained abrasions on her feet – likely after walking on glass shards during the sinking – which have left her unable to walk and sitting in a wheelchair, La Repubblica reports, while she also has bandages on others part of her body.
Another survivor is Clifford Chance lawyer Ayla Ronald, 36, who was part of the successful legal team invited to go sailing with Lynch, according to her father Lin.
On-board hostess Leah Randall, 20, from South Africa, also survived the tragedy.
Heidi Randall, Leah’s mother, told Sky News: ‘I’m beyond relieved that my daughter’s life was spared by the grace of God.
‘It doesn’t make it any easier living with heartache of those who have lost their lives or missing.’
Leah was photographed leaving the coast guard headquarters yesterday alongside a fellow crew member.
Leah and 22-year-old on-board hostess Katja Chicken, from Germany, said as they were questioned by investigators: ‘We are alive by a miracle,’ according to Italian news agency ANSA, who reported that one of the girls sobbed as she said: ‘It was terrible.’
Other survivors included Irish woman Sasha Murray, 29, Matthew Fletcher, 41, from London, James Catfield 51, from New Zealand, Myin Htun Kyaw, 39, from Myanmar, crew member Leo Eppel and Frenchman Matthew Griffith.
On Tuesday evening two crew members, Tus Koopmans and Eaton Parker, were also named as survivors. No age or nationalities were provided.
Speaking from a hospital room in the town of Termini Imerese close to Palermo, Mr Catfied, in a state of grief and shock, could only utter one sentence.
‘We didn’t see it coming,’ he told La Repubblica.
Rescuers claimed that survivors spoke of the ship going down in ‘two minutes’ and that it appears that the yacht ‘wasn’t anchored in a safe place’ at the time of sinking.
They were rescued by crews from nearby boats including that of Karsten Borner, the captain of a sailing ship anchored near the Bayesian, who said his team struggled to keep their boat afloat when the tornado hit.
Fabio Cefalu, a fisherman in Porticello who witnessed the tragedy unfold, said he saw a waterspout – a sort of mini-tornado – that lasted about 12 minutes shortly before 4am.
At around 4.10am he said he saw a red flare go off from Bayesian but by the time he was able to reach the area about 20 minutes later the yacht had all but disappeared. ‘We found only the cushions, and a few planks floating in the water,’ he said.