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Body of British tech entrepreneur Lynch retrieved from yacht, daughter missing

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• Interior ministry official confirmed Lynch's death
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Who was onboard tech mogul Mike Lynch's Bayesian yacht?

Topic: Disasters, Accidents and Emergency Incidents

Six people are missing, including a man dubbed the British Bill Gates, after a luxury yacht sank off the Sicilian coast.

British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch — freshly acquitted from a decade-long trial — had invited his work colleagues aboard a trip through the Mediterranean coast when a freak storm saw the yacht sink within moments.

Fifteen people escaped from the sinking vessel. The search for the missing continues.

Here's what we know so far: 

What happened?

The Italian coastguard said the yacht — the Bayesian — was anchored off the shore of port city Porticello, near the Sicilian capital Palermo, when it was hit by bad weather sometime after 4am on Monday, local time. 

Eyewitnesses said it vanished quickly beneath the waves shortly before dawn.

Managers of the sailing vessel Bayesian, Camper & Nicholsons, confirmed to the ABC that the Bayesian encountered severe weather and subsequently sank. 

"Our priority is assisting with the ongoing search and providing all necessary support to the rescued passengers and crew," they said. 

"The wind was very strong. Bad weather was expected, but not of this magnitude," a coastguard official told Reuters.

Sicily's civil protection agency head, Salvo Cocina, said a waterspout — a tornado over the water — could have struck the yacht.

"They were in the wrong place at the wrong time," Mr Cocina added. 

Storms and heavy rainfall had swept down Italy in recent days after weeks of scorching heat, lifting the temperature of the Mediterranean Sea to record levels and raising the risk of extreme weather conditions, experts told Reuters.

"The sea surface temperature around Sicily was around 30 degrees Celsius, which is almost 3 degrees more than normal. This creates an enormous source of energy that contributes to these storms," meteorologist Luca Mercalli said.

Rescuers recover the body of one of the people aboard the Bayesian.  ( AP: Lucio Ganci )

Captain Karsten Borner of the Sir Robert Baden Powell vessel told journalists he noticed the Bayesian nearby during the storm, but after it calmed he saw a red flare and realised the ship had simply disappeared.

Mr Borner said he and a crew member boarded their tender and found a lifeboat with 15 people, some of them injured, who they then took aboard and alerted the coast guard.

Search crews, including helicopters and divers, are continuing to search the wreckage, lying at a depth of 49 metres.

Specialist divers reached the ship on Monday but access was limited due to objects in the way, the fire brigade said.

The UK Marine Accident Investigation Branch is deploying a team of four inspectors to Italy to conduct a preliminary assessment.

The Foreign Commonwealth and Development office said it was "providing consular support to a number of British nationals and their families".

Sicilian prosecutors have also opened an investigation into the event. 

Who is missing?

Lawyer Chris Morvillo (left), entrepreneur Mike Lynch, and Morgan Stanley chairman Jonathan Bloomer are among the missing. 

There were 12 passengers and 10 crew members aboard the yacht. 

Mr Cocina said the crew and passengers hailed from a variety of countries, including Britain, the United States, Antigua, France, Germany, Ireland, Myanmar, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Spain.

Of the 22, one man is confirmed dead and another six people are still missing. 

They are believed to be inside the hull, fire rescue spokesperson Luca Cari said.

Fabio Cefalù, a fisherman who said he responded to a flare from the vessel but found it sunk, said he stayed at the site for three hours without finding anyone.

"I think they are inside, all the missing people," he said.

Rescue teams recovered the body of the yacht's onboard chef on Monday, identified as Antiguan citizen Ricardo Thomas.

The still missing people include: 

• Mr Lynch's 18-year-old daughter, Hannah 
• Jonathan Bloomer, chairman of global financial services company Morgan Stanley International
• Chris Morvillo , a lawyer at the British multinational law firm Clifford Chance. He worked on Mr Lynch's lawsuit against Hewlett-Packard
• The identities of the remaining two missing are still unconfirmed

Who was rescued? 

Fifteen people escaped from the sinking ship. 

Eight have been hospitalised and others were taken to a nearby hotel.

Charlotte Golunski was among those rescued, recalling the harrowing moments she held her child Sofia above the waves.  ( Supplied: Facebook  )

Among those rescued were:

• Mr Lynch's wife, Angela Bacares, who was the owner of the yacht
• Charlotte Golunski and her one-year-old daughter, Sofia. Ms Golunski is a partner at Mr Lynch's firm, Invoke Capital. She says she momentarily lost hold of Sofia in the water but managed to hold her up above the waves until the lifeboat was inflated
• Ms Golunski's husband James Emslie
• New Zealand captain of the yacht James Catfield. He told Italian newspaper La Repubblica the crew didn't see the storm coming
• A lone Dutch citizen was identified by the Dutch foreign ministry as being rescued, but was not identified

Who is Mike Lynch?

Mr Lynch, once hailed as Britain’s king of technology, was recently freed from a Silicon Valley lawsuit that tarnished his legacy. 

The 59-year-old Cambridge-educated mathematician created Autonomy , a search engine that could pore through emails and other internal business documents to help companies find vital information more quickly. 

He received the OBE for his innovation in 2006. 

He then sold the software to Hewlett-Packard (HP) for $US11 billion ($16 billion) in 2011, with Mr Lynch personally netting $US800 million. 

HP valued Autonomy at $US46 billion ($68 billion) in the months leading up to the deal.

Mike Lynch in 2019 leaving the High Court in London.  ( Reuters: Henry Nicholls/File Photo )

But the deal quickly turned sour after he was accused of forging the software's financial records to make the sale.

As part of a decades-long legal battle against HP, Mr Lynch was extradited to the UK on criminal fraud charges. 

He steadfastly denied any wrongdoing, asserting that he was being made a scapegoat for HP's own bungling. 

He was eventually cleared of all charges in June this year. 

Although he avoided a possible prison sentence, Lynch still faced a bill from a civil case in London that HP mostly won during 2022. Damages haven't been determined in that case, but HP is seeking $US4 billion. 

Following the San Francisco trial, Mr Lynch said he would return to the UK and do what he loved most: "[being with] my family and innovating in my field."

The holiday appeared to be something of a celebration after Mr Lynch's acquittal, with guests including some of the people who had stood by Lynch throughout the ordeal.

This picture shows the rescue operations off the Sicilian coast.  ( AP: Italian Coast Guard  )

In a separate act of tragedy, Mr Lynch's co-defendant in the trial, Stephen Chamberlain, died on Monday, after a road accident left him critically injured.

Mr Chamberlain — Autonomy's former vice-president of finance alongside Mr Lynch — was hit by a car in Cambridgeshire on Saturday morning and had been placed on life support. 

What is the Bayesian?

The luxury yacht is 56m long sailboat, with a 75m mast labelled as the tallest aluminium mast in the world.

It was previously named Salute when it flew under a Dutch flag.

The yacht, built in 2008 by the Italian firm Perini Navi, can accommodate up to 12 guests in six suites and a crew of 10, according to online specialist yacht sites. It was last refitted in 2020.

Online charter sites listed it for rent for up to 195,000 euros (about $AU 321,000) a week. 

This picture taken on Sunday shows the Bayesian (left) and the Duch sailboat Sir Robert Baden Powell anchored off the coast line.   ( AP: Fabio La Bianca/Baia Santa Nicolicchia )

The ship also won a string of awards for its design. 

Ms Golunski said the yacht had travelled through the Aeolian Islands, Milazzo and Cefalù before sinking. 

It is likely the yacht's name would resonate with Mr Lynch because his PhD thesis and the software that made his fortune was based on Bayesian theory.

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The 16 minutes that plunged the Bayesian yacht into a death spiral

Until midnight last Sunday, Matteo Cannia was sitting out on a bench overlooking the sea in Porticello. It was too hot to sleep.

The 78-year-old, a fisherman since the age of 10, saw the first flashes of lightning. "I heard the thunder and the wind and decided to go home," he told me.

"As the storm grew, everyone woke. Water was coming into my friend’s house."

At about 04:15 local time, Fabio Cefalù – a fisherman who had been due to go out that wild Monday morning but, like others, decided against it – suddenly saw a flare go up.

He changed his mind and went out to sea to find out what was going on – and discovered only cushions and floating planks of wood.

A luxury super yacht called the Bayesian, moored only a few hundred metres away, had already sunk.

It all happened in a 16-minute window of disaster , chaos and torment, which catapulted a sleepy Sicilian fishing port to the centre of world news.

All but seven of the 22 passengers of the Bayesian had scrambled into a life raft as the yacht began to capsize. The others never made it out.

Charlotte Golunski, a British woman, was thrown into the water with her one-year-old daughter, Sophie. She told of clutching her baby in the air with all her strength to keep her from drowning. "It was all black around me," she said, "and the only thing I could hear were the screams of others."

She, her baby, and her husband James were among those rescued by a nearby sailing boat captain. Trapped inside the sinking Bayesian was her colleague Mike Lynch – one of the UK’s top tech entrepreneurs, dubbed “Britain’s Bill Gates”.

Luxury turned to terror

Mr Lynch had brought together family, friends and colleagues for an idyllic holiday on his luxury boat: a sumptuous 56-metre (184ft) sailing yacht that won design awards and had the world’s tallest aluminium mast.

In June, he was acquitted after a lengthy trial in the US on charges that he had fraudulently inflated the value of his company, Autonomy, before selling it to Hewlett Packard in 2011. The trip was planned as a celebration of freedom to mark his rehabilitation in public opinion.

Three days after the yacht went down, his body was retrieved by divers from the wreckage.

A day later, the body of his 18-year-old daughter Hannah, who was due to begin studying at the University of Oxford next month, was recovered.

Among the others who died were the president of the investment bank Morgan Stanley, Jonathan Bloomer, and his wife Judy; Mr Lynch’s lawyer Chris Morvillo and his wife Neda; and the yacht’s chef, Recaldo Thomas. Mr Lynch’s wife, Angela Bacares, survived.

The family has released a statement talking of their “unspeakable grief”, adding they are “devastated and in shock”.

How the super yacht sank so quickly while other smaller vessels nearby survived the storm undamaged has dumbfounded experts.

In a press conference this weekend – the first public statement by officials since the disaster – local prosecutors said they had begun an investigation into potential crimes of manslaughter and negligent shipwreck.

The region’s state prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio told reporters that while the probe was at a very early stage and nobody specific was being investigated, there were “many possibilities for culpability. It could be just the captain. It could be the whole crew… we are absolutely not ruling anything out”.

A small team of British marine investigators has also been sent to Sicily to work with their Italian counterparts.

Prosecutors said that they now believed a downburst was the weather phenomenon that hit the ship: a localised, powerful wind that descends from a thunderstorm and spreads unpredictably.

That contradicted previous reports that had identified the cause as a waterspout , or mini tornado at sea.

Either way, it’s clear extreme weather played a major role.

The crucial 16-minute window

Much of the focus for the investigation team is of course on the conduct of the captain, 51-year-old James Cutfield from New Zealand. He survived, along with eight of his crew, and is being questioned.

“We didn’t see it coming,” he told Italian media, alluding to the storm, in his only public comment so far.

The problem is: plenty of others did. Violent winds and rain were forecast, following days of searing heat. The head of the company that built the Bayesian, Giovanni Costantino, told me he was convinced there had been a litany of errors on board.

“At the back of the boat, a hatch must have been left open,” he said, “but also perhaps a side entrance for water to have poured inside.

"Before the storm, the captain should have closed every opening, lifted anchor, turned on the engine, pointed into the wind and lowered the keel."

A keel is a large, fin-like part of the boat that protrudes from its base.

"That would have stabilised the vessel, they would have been able to traverse the storm and continue their cruise in comfort," he said.

Rescuers instead found the wreckage of the Bayesian 50 metres underwater with its almost 10-metre-long keel raised .

Had it been deployed, it could have helped counter the wind buffeting the Bayesian’s 75-metre high aluminium mast and kept the ship stable. But without it, experts told the newspaper La Repubblica that gusts of 100 kilometres an hour (62mph) would have been enough to capsize the ship – and Monday’s storm far exceeded that.

“The Bayesian was a model for many other vessels because of its stability and exceptionally high performance,” Mr Costantino said. “There was absolutely no problem with it. If water hadn’t surged in, it was unsinkable.”

He told me there were 16 minutes between the power going out on the ship at 03:56 – showing that water was flooding areas with electrical circuits – and the GPS signal being lost, indicating the moment it sank.

That period, along with any measures taken to mitigate the extreme weather, will be pored over by investigators, particularly once they locate the vessel’s black box recorder.

Rino Casilli, one of Sicily’s top ship surveyors, similarly believes that errors may have made the yacht vulnerable to the extreme weather.

“There should have been two members of the crew taking turns to be on watch overnight, given the storm warning,” he told me as he took me out on his boat – around a third of the size of the Bayesian. “And it should have been moored in the harbour, not out at sea.”

It has not yet been established how many people, if any, were on watch that night.

From his sailing boat, we gained rare access to the spot where the Bayesian went down.

Around us, an Italian police vessel circulated, warning us back. Suddenly, there was a flurry of activity among divers, as other rescue vessels arrived.

We didn’t know at the time – but they had just located more bodies.

It was an intensely challenging operation for the teams to recover those trapped in the wreckage. Given its depth, at 50 metres underwater, each diver was allowed 10 minutes down before resurfacing for their safety – 120 dives in total. They were assisted by remote control vehicles that could operate on the seabed for far longer.

In this weekend’s press conference, rescuers said the passengers trapped inside during the sinking took refuge in cabins on the ship’s left side, where the last air bubbles formed.

Five of the bodies were found in the first cabin on the left, they said, while the last body – confirmed as Hannah Lynch – was in the third cabin on the left side.

Access for the emergency teams was extremely difficult since the yacht remained largely intact with its furniture obstructing entry.

The coastguard compared it to an “18-storey building full of water”. When Ms Lynch’s body was brought ashore emergency workers on the port applauded their colleagues.

All seven of the dead have been transported to a mortuary for post-mortems.

Rescuers will now need to decide whether – and how – to salvage the wreckage, which would undoubtedly offer vital clues as to what happened. But bringing the Bayesian to the surface could take six to eight weeks and cost 15 million euros (£12.7m) by some estimates.

The hunt for clarity

While the divers’ painstaking work to recover the dead has ended, the investigators’ painful hunt for answers has only begun.

They and the survivors are hunkered down in a hotel close to Porticello, which is strictly off-limits to journalists. Security guards promptly asked us to leave.

Solving the enigma of what happened to the Bayesian will be crucial not only to help loved ones of the victims reach some sort of closure, but also for the maritime industry to draw conclusions.

The brother of James Cutfield, the captain, said he was a “well-respected” sailor who had worked on boats his whole life. Did the experienced sailor somehow make a series of catastrophic errors? The trade union Nautilus, which represents seafarers and captains, called for restraint in passing judgement on the Bayesian’s crew.

"Any attempt to question their conduct without the full facts is not only unfair but also harmful to the process of uncovering the truth and learning any lessons from this tragedy," it said.

The world’s media has begun to leave Porticello, which is gradually returning to the tranquillity of its pre-Bayesian era. Stray cats roam among the old fishing boats, and children play as their families eat out at the few seaside restaurants.

But what has happened over the past week has stunned and scarred many here.

“Last Sunday night, we saw the end of the world in Porticello,” said resident Maria Vizzo. “We’ve never seen something like this. Everyone here is shocked – and everyone is crying.”

More on this story

Tributes to 'brilliant' Mike and Hannah Lynch as family speak of shock

Bayesian sinking: The key questions for investigators

Manslaughter considered by Sicily yacht sinking investigators

Five things we learned from Sicily yacht press conference

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Search Resumes for British Mogul and 5 Others After Yacht Sinks Off Sicily

The body of the vessel’s cook was recovered while divers searched the hull of the Bayesian for passengers, including the tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch.

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By Elisabetta Povoledo

Deep-sea divers with Italy’s firefighter corps resumed their search on Tuesday for six missing passengers — including a British software mogul and his daughter — of a yacht that sank off the coast of Sicily the previous day.

Twenty-two people were on board the 180-foot British-flagged sailing yacht, the Bayesian, which was anchored near the port of Porticello, when it was hit by what witnesses described as a waterspout, a small tornado on water, during a sudden and violent storm.

Fifteen people who managed to get to a raft were rescued by the captain of a nearby sailing cruise ship. The body of the yacht’s cook, identified by news outlets as Recaldo Thomas, a Canadian Antiguan, was recovered on Monday. But several people are still unaccounted for, according to Salvatore Cocina, an official with Sicily’s civil protection agency.

Those still missing are Mike Lynch, a British technology entrepreneur; his daughter Hannah; Jonathan Bloomer, chairman of Morgan Stanley International; his wife, Judy Bloomer; Christopher J. Morvillo, a lawyer at Clifford Chance; and his wife, Neda Morvillo.

Mr. Lynch was acquitted of fraud in a U.S. trial in June, ending a high-profile, decadelong legal battle against accusations that he had defrauded Hewlett-Packard when he sold his company, Autonomy, to Hewlett for $11 billion.

Mr. Lynch and the others went missing days after Mr. Lynch’s co-defendant at the fraud trial, Stephen Chamberlain, a former vice president of finance at Autonomy, was fatally struck by a car on Saturday while out for a run, his lawyer, Gary S. Lincenberg, said in a statement.

Prosecutors in the Italian city of Termini Imerese, east of where the yacht sank, are opening a formal investigation into the yacht’s sinking. Reached by telephone, the chief prosecutor declined to comment.

The search for the missing passengers began on Monday but was suspended late that night as crews found themselves limited to the bridge deck and items like furnishings “obstructing passage,” the firefighters’ corps wrote on social media .

When divers resumed the search on Tuesday, ships trawled the waters near the site, the corps said in a statement. The Italian Coast Guard also said in a statement that search operations were “continuing unabated,” with the deployment of helicopters. There was no evidence that gasoline was leaking from the yacht, the Coast Guard said.

The yacht was lying on its right side in about 165 feet of water, meaning that divers, working in pairs, could stay underwater for only about 12 minutes at a time, said Luca Cari, a spokesman for the firefighters’ corps.

Divers were seeking a safe point of access to the vessel’s cabins. “Obviously, everything fell and the space is very tight,” Mr. Cari said, adding that the divers were having to remove obstacles, like furnishings and electrical wiring, that were “completely blocking passages.”

The firefighters’ corps said in a statement that it was impossible to verify whether people were inside the hull.

Mr. Cari said that several divers had been part of the search-and-rescue operations when the Costa Concordia, a cruise liner, capsized off the Tuscan island of Giglio in 2012, killing 32 people. It is considered one of the worst maritime disasters in modern Italian history.

“It’s like the Costa Concordia, but much smaller,” Mr. Cari said in a telephone interview, comparing the search operations. “In the Costa Concordia, we came across many obstacles but we somehow were able to overcome them. Here, the obstacles block the passages and have to be removed.” He added, “This makes it more difficult.”

Crews were also trying to raise the yacht, which experts will examine to try to determine why it sank. Until then, experts can only hypothesize what happened.

Karsten Borner, the captain of a ship, the Sir Robert Baden Powell, which picked up the Bayesian’s 15 survivors, said in an interview that when the wind picked up around 4 a.m. Monday, the Bayesian was about 490 feet behind his vessel. Once the wind wound down, he said, he could not see the yacht anymore.

“My theory was that she was capsized first and then went down over the stern,” Mr. Borner said.

Dario Boote, a ship structures and naval architecture professor at the University of Genoa, said: “Now I imagine that a whole series of lawsuits will be triggered, obviously to ascertain whether there is any responsibility, as always happens very unpleasantly in these situations.” He said, however, that in this case, responsibility might be hard to determine. “Clearly, only once the wreck is raised will we know more,” he added.

Several fishermen told Italian news outlets that they had witnessed a waterspout. Peter Inness, a meteorologist at the University of Reading, said they were relatively common in the Mediterranean, though their occurrence and intensity are unpredictable.

“Until one actually forms, you can’t start telling people where it is,” Mr. Inness said, or “how to get out of the way.”

The inclement weather — with lightning intermittently streaking through the sky — made it hard to know exactly why the yacht sank. Col. Attilio Di Diodato, director of the Italian Air Force’s Center for Aerospace Meteorology and Climatology, said the agency had registered intense lightning activity and strong gusts of wind in the area at the time the boat sank.

The Bayesian had one of the tallest aluminum masts in the world, according to its builder, Perini Navi. “Having a tall aluminum mast would not make it the safest port to be in case of a storm,” said Andrea Ratti, associate professor of nautical design and architecture technology the Politecnico di Milano. The type of intensity unleashed by a violent lightning storm “could have created a significant shock wave,” he added.

He, too, cautioned that “a lot of questions will remain until we have other elements at our disposal.”

Modern yachts are built to withstand meteorological events of reasonable intensity, and all international naval registers suggest that new ships be designed for higher waves and more frequent and extreme weather events.

But “this seems a case of an unreasonable extreme event,” said Emilio Fortunato Campana, an expert in Naval Hydrodynamics at Italy’s National Research Council. “In that case, no ship is 100 percent safe,” he added. “I think the Titanic showed that nothing is unsinkable.”

Elisabetta Povoledo is a reporter based in Rome, covering Italy, the Vatican and the culture of the region. She has been a journalist for 35 years. More about Elisabetta Povoledo

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A number of innovative features and sophisticated entertainment areas make IAG motor yacht SERENITY an ideal choice for your next luxury yacht charter

The 40.4m/132'7" 'Serenity' motor yacht built by shipyard IAG Yachts is available for charter for up to 12 guests in 6 cabins. This yacht features interior styling by British designer Evan K Marshall.

Built in 2016, Serenity offers beautifully proportioned decks for exquisite indoor/outdoor living during a luxury yacht charter . She has sensational features such as underwater lights and beach club.

Guest Accommodation

Serenity offers guest accommodation for up to 12 guests in 6 suites comprising a master suite, one VIP cabin, two double cabins, one twin cabin and one cabin that can operate as twin or double. The supremely spacious full beam master suite benefits from a his and her bathroom. The bed configuration includes 1 king and 5 queen. She is also capable of carrying up to 7 crew onboard to ensure a relaxed luxury yacht charter experience.

Onboard Comfort & Entertainment

You and your guests can enjoy a variety of experiences on Serenity including a beach club for you to relax on the edge of the water. Sit back with a glass of champagne in the deck jacuzzi.

Whatever your activities on your charter, you'll find some impressive features are seamlessly integrated to help you including the underwater lights, adding spectacle and style after dark. Take advantage of the on board Wi-Fi and stay connected at all times and you can stay comfortable on board whatever the weather, with air conditioning during your charter.

Performance & Range

Built with a GRP hull and GRP superstructure, she benefits from a semi-displacement hull to provide exceptional seakeeping and impressive speeds. Powered by twin Caterpillar engines, she comfortably cruises at 12 knots, reaches a maximum speed of 18 knots with a range of up to 3,000 nautical miles from her 9,500 gallon fuel tanks at cruising speed.

Onboard Serenity has a large selection of toys and accessories to keep you and your guests entertained on the water throughout your stay. Principle among these are waterslides for guests of all ages to enjoy. Take to the sea on the Jet Skis offering you power and control on the water. Also there are towable toys offering fun and adventure. If that isn't enough Serenity also features a seabob, wakeboards, kayaks, WindSurfers, fishing equipment and much more. When it comes to Tenders, Serenity has you covered - with two tenders, including a 10.36m/34' Custom Edge Water Tender.

Serenity is available upon request for charter this summer. She is already accepting bookings this winter for cruising in the Caribbean.

With its luxurious interiors, vast array of onboard facilities and a highly-trained and professional crew, a luxury yacht vacation onboard motor yacht Serenity promises to be nothing short of spectacular.

TESTIMONIALS

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Serenity Photos

Amenities & Entertainment

For your relaxation and entertainment Serenity has the following facilities, for more details please speak to your yacht charter broker.

Rendez-vous diving only.

Serenity is reported to be available to Charter with the following recreation facilities:

• 1 x 10.36m  /  34' Custom Edge Water Tender with 2 x Yamaha 450 HP engines
• 1 x 3.66m  /  12' Williams Jet Tenders Tender

For a full list of all available amenities & entertainment facilities, or price to hire additional equipment please contact your broker.

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For a full list of all available amenities & entertainment facilities, or price to hire additional equipment please contact your broker.

'Serenity' Charter Rates & Destinations

Summer Season

May - September

$145,000 p/week + expenses

High Season

$175,000 p/week + expenses

Cruising Regions

HOT SPOTS:   New England

Winter Season

October - April

Caribbean Antigua, Bahamas, Saint Martin, St Barts

HOT SPOTS:   Florida, Virgin Islands

Charter Serenity

To charter this luxury yacht contact your charter broker , or we can help you.

To charter this luxury yacht contact your charter broker or

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NOTE to U.S. Customs & Border Protection

Specification

SEASONAL CHARTER RATES

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Boat Rentals/Charters

Serenity Yacht Cruise

This Location:

Encounter the most magnificent Tahoe experience yet. Take an Emerald Bay Cruise aboard the Tahoe Serenity, our exquisite 63’ luxury yacht. Enjoy a guided tour of Tahoe’s incomparable shoreline or book an elite private charter for your wedding or special event. Whichever you choose, you’ll find out why she’s named Tahoe Serenity.

Daily Excursions

Emerald Bay 2.5-Hour Cruise 11-1:30 & 2-4:30 $94/adults • $50/kids under 12

Daily cruises limited to 75 passengers

Weddings on the Tahoe Serenity

300 U.S. Hwy 50 (Round Hill Pines Beach Resort), Zephyr Cove, NV 89448

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• Cruise Ports
• South America Cruise Ports

Guayaquil (Ecuador)

Cruise port schedule, live map, terminals, news.

Region South America

Local Time 2024-08-25 13:16

Port Guayaquil cruise ship schedule shows timetable calendars of all arrival and departure dates by month. The port's schedule lists all ships (in links) with cruises going to or leaving from Guayaquil, Ecuador. To see the full itineraries (ports of call dates and arrival / departure times) and their lowest rates – just follow the corresponding ship-link.

Guayaquil is Ecuador's largest seaport and biggest city, with population around 3,5 million (metro over 5 million). Port Guayaquil (locode ECGYE) is on Guayas River's western bank (across Isla Santay/river island) and the river connects it directly to the Pacific Ocean.

In Guayaquil are registered all deployed in the Galapagos cruise vessels, thus choosing Ecuador as their flag-state .

Guayaquil is Guayas province's capital and was founded twice by Spanish conquistadors - in 1535 (by Sebastian de Benalcazar) and in 1537 (by Francisco de Orellana). Among current-day city's best-known attractions is the Malecon 2000 - a tree-lined waterfront complex with gardens, outdoor playgrounds, restaurants, shops, fountains, museum, photo- and art galleries. Nearby are also located Club de la Union, Moorish clock tower, Government Palace. The old district Las Penas is a reminder of the town's colonial times - featuring narrow, cobbled streets, brightly painted wooden houses, a 16th-century church.

In Parque Centenario is the monument commemorating the Guayaquil Conference of 1822 - between South American statesmen Jose de San Martín and Simón Bolívar. The Ecological Reserve of Manglares Churute and Cerro Blanco Forest Reserve are outside the city. Visitors can take canoes into the mangroves there to watch wildlife. From Guayaquil, cruise passengers can also visit Ecuador's capital Quito City .

Port Guayaquil

At Puerto Guayaquil,  boxships are handled at a dedicated terminal managed by CGSA (Contecon Guayaquil SA - a subsidiary of ICTSI/International Container Terminal Services Inc ( Manila Philipines -based multinational). CGSA is the country's top port serving the shipping trade with bananas, cocoa, wood, shrimp, fish, raw materials, general merchandise. Nearly 85% of Ecuador’s imports/exports pass through Port Guayaquil.

In October 2018, Jan De Nul Group ( Luxembourg -based company specializing in dredging and offshore projects) was awarded a 25-year concession contract (until 2043) for deepening and maintenance dredging of Port Guayaquil's access channel (length 95 km / 60 mi). After completion, the project will allow even the world's largest boxships to access Guayaquil Port Terminals - among South America's newest and largest cargo handling facilities.

The works include deepening the waterway from 9,8 to 12,5 m (33 to 41 ft) as max draught/depth at high tide. The contractor will use three hopper dredgers (trailing suction ships) and one CSD (cutter suction dredger). The project also includes removing the "Los Goles" rock (in the channel's offshore section), installing of latest-technology systems (vessel traffic control, toll collection), dredging "Canal Fluvial" (on Rio Guayas).

Channel's deepening was completed in 9 months (in late-January 2020). Jan De Nul's fleet of 4 dredgers removed ~25 million m3 of sediments plus the Los Goles rock formation. The first boxship that navigated the deepened waterway was APL Esplanade (Neo-Panamax class container carrier with capacity 14000 TEUs).

On April 4, 2023, Port Guayaquil handled its largest vessel - Maersk Camden (IMO 9924194, 2022-built boxship with max capacity 15400 TEUs).

Guayaquil cruise terminal

After berthing at the Guayaquil port, cruise ships provide complimentary transportation (via the ship's tender boats) to Malecon 2000. This is a boardwalk (waterfront promenade section / the old Simon Bolívar boardwalk) that overlooks Guayas River.

This popular area is divided into 3 parts:

• The northern section includes grand plazas, fountains, outdoor kids playground areas for aerobics and games, Planetarium, anthropological Museum, Contemporary Art Museum, IMAX movie theater).
• The central section includes the historic Civic Plaza (Moorish Clock Tower, Rotonda Monument), also Guayaquil Yacht Club and Naval Yacht Club.
• The southern section has the Bahía Malecon Shopping Center (shopping, entertainment and dining complex).

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Serenity Yacht Cruises and Private Event Rental

Daily Emerald Bay Cruises Aboard The Tahoe Serenity

Private Event Rental Private cruises are available for groups of up to 75 guests. Whether it’s a bachelor or bachelorette party, family reunion, or company celebration, make it an event to remember with an exclusive Lake Tahoe cruise.

Please contact our Group Event specialist at 775.588.3057 .

Wedding Ceremonies A private wedding celebration on Lake Tahoe aboard the Serenity is a truly spectacular way to celebrate your love. Packages start with a 3-hour cruise and champagne toast for up to 75 guests.

Please contact us for Private Charter information and reservations: 775-588-3057

Mengi-Yay SERENITY II yacht charter

Overall information

PDF brochure

Yachts by Mengi-Yay Yachts

Yachts charter Mengi-Yay Yachts

€99,750 per week

Super yacht SERENITY II (40m/131’) is a Mengi Yay luxury, full displacement charter boat, built in Turkey in 2010.  Her naval and exterior architecture was designed by Endaze Muhendislik.  The interior design is the work of London based H2 Yacht Design who created a very stylish and modern surroundings, so that she now represents an elegant and distinctive mega yacht providing guests with a great variety of entertainment options during luxury crewed charters in the East Mediterranean.   When boarding MY SERENITY II you will you enter a world of luxury and sophistication,  great attention to detail and space. Large side windows on all decks and spacious open view areas provide fabulous vistas all around, creating sublime views of the sea.  Innovative accommodation solution is one of the key elements in the construction of this yacht as she offers a very special deck plan to accommodate 12 guests in 6 cabins. The full beam owners deck and owner’s lounge is located on main deck.  The spectacular lounge and dining room are also the main deck, with this level is dedicated to general comfort and use of all the guests on board.  The 2 VIPs and 2 guest cabins are on the lower deck.