Gemma Collins says she is ‘lucky to have survived’ storm in Sicily as tech tycoon Mike Lynch and his daughter are still missing after yacht sank

Gemma Collins said she was “very lucky to have survived” after being hit by the terrible storm that hit Sicily on Monday.

British tech magnate Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter Hannah are still missing after their luxury superyacht capsized near Porticello.

Six people, reportedly four Britons and two Americans, are still missing, while 15 passengers were rescued by a nearby ship, including a British mother and her one-year-old daughter. One body has been recovered.

Gemma, 43, and her nephew Hayden, 15, who were on board another luxury liner, were left shocked after being stranded at sea for four hours.

In an update she shared on Instagram, she wrote: ‘Holiday update. My sincere condolences to those affected by the tragic disaster at sea in Sicily.’

Gemma continues: ‘I was very lucky that my nephew and I survived the storm at sea.’

‘I am in shock and heading back to the UK tomorrow. God was on our side. We were stuck for 4 hours today. Can you imagine what was going through my mind? Thank you @bluediamondcruise for getting us back safely.’

Specialist divers involved in the search said on Tuesday that the £30 million vessel, the Bayesian, had sunk to the seabed 50 metres below the surface with “virtually everything intact”. Entry was blocked by furniture.

The luxury yacht capsized early Monday morning after being hit by a waterspout at around 5am. The captain of the ill-fated vessel said after he and 15 others were rescued from the water: “We didn’t see it coming.”

Those involved in the rescue operations compared the incident to the “Costa Concordia disaster on a smaller scale” and added that they would do “everything to recover the bodies” despite the deteriorating weather conditions.

Tornado-like winds caused the superyacht to capsize so quickly that the crew had no time to raise the alarm or call for help. They had to swim for their lives, and those who did make it were stranded in pitch darkness as the storm raged around them.

The ship’s chef, Ricardo Thomas, was found dead at sea by search parties yesterday. Hopes of finding survivors alive in trapped air bubbles are fading fast as the rescue operation continues.

British tech magnate Mike Lynch, his 18-year-old daughter Hannah, Morgan Stanley International Bank chairman Jonathan Bloomer and his wife Judy, and Clifford Chance lawyer Chris Morvillo, who represented Lynch in a recent legal battle, are reported missing.

Lynch had invited family and friends to the yacht to celebrate his “second life” after being acquitted of all charges in a US fraud trial. In an extraordinary twist, his co-defendant Stephen Chamberlain – who was also acquitted of the charges – has also died after being hit by a car while jogging in England over the weekend.

The luxury sailing ship was anchored just a few hundred metres off the coast of Porticello in calm seas when it was suddenly hit by a violent waterspout at around 5am on Monday morning.

It is believed the ship sank after its mast, one of the tallest in the world at a whopping 75 metres, During the horrific incident, the ship snapped and capsized, causing its hull to submerge further than the “downward angle,” nautical experts said.

Inspector Marco Tilotta, head of the diving unit of the Palermo fire brigade, compared the horrific search to the 2012 Costa Concordia cruise ship disaster, which killed 33 people.

Chillingly, diving specialists called in for the search and rescue operation found ‘virtually everything intact’ on board, with few signs of damage and ‘no cracks in the side, no signs of impact’, he told MailOnline.

The boat rests on its starboard (right) side on the seabed, 164 feet below the waves, and initial attempts by dive teams to move furniture that was obstructing their access to the cabins below were unsuccessful, Inspector Tilotta said.

Rescuers are still hoping that, against all odds, survivors will be found in trapped air pockets, but Inspector Tilotta admitted that “it is a race against time and the quality of oxygen will be poor”.

However, his choice of words told the unpleasant truth: ‘We will do everything we can to recover the bodies. The weather conditions are deteriorating, but we hope to continue the operations without problems’.

As the first divers returned from the site, threatening dark clouds formed above their heads.

“We just finished the first dive, now we have a briefing and then we’ll continue all day,” he added.

“We have checked the hull from the outside. The visibility is good. Now our goal is to penetrate the ship.”

Now it is up to the group of cave divers from Rome and Sassari, who have specialized training and equipment, to enter the yacht and take stock of the situation. Some of them, the inspector says, have also worked on the Costa Concordia case.

In the coming hours and days, accident investigators will have to figure out how the ship sank while other ships suffered little damage and how the ship was still intact.

The whirlwind is described as “extremely intense, sudden and very local,” the inspector told Il Messaggero.

The ship’s captain, named by Italian media as James Catfield, said those on board were surprised by the sudden chaos on Monday morning.

From a hospital room in the town of Termini Imerese, near Palermo, the captain, in a state of grief and shock, could only utter one sentence.

“We didn’t see it coming,” he said The Republic.

Former shipyard manager and maritime technical inspector Gino Ciriaci told the Italian daily Corriere Della Sera said Once the mast fell, the ship was much more likely to roll and pitch as the waves battered the ship and there were no sails to keep it steady.

In the case of the Bayesian storm, he said that the waterspout was so violent that the boat, carried away by the broken mast, tipped over until the edge of the deck disappeared below the water’s surface.

The entire ordeal probably lasted only a few minutes, with the ship sinking quickly due to seawater ingress.

Divers reached the ship yesterday afternoon, but their search encountered unexpected problems.

“Access to the bridge was restricted due to furniture blocking the divers’ passage,” the fire department said in a statement.

The search was made even more difficult by the fact that the ship was lying on the seabed at a depth of 50 meters, which limits the amount of time divers can stay underwater, according to Luca Cari, spokesman for the fire department.

Meanwhile, survivors of the tragedy were taken to various hospitals on the island of Sicily, where they told stories of their terrible ordeals.

Among the 15 people rescued was one-year-old Sofia, who was kept afloat by her mother, 36-year-old Charlotte Golunski.

Golunski, an Oxford graduate and senior associate at Mike Lynch’s firm Invoke Capital, yesterday spoke of her battle to prevent her child from drowning.

“For two seconds I lost my baby in the sea, but then I immediately hugged her again in the wild waves,” said Mrs Golunski.

“I kept her afloat with all my strength, my arms reaching out to keep her from drowning,” she added.

‘It was completely dark. In the water I couldn’t keep my eyes open. I screamed for help, but all I could hear around me were the screams of others.’

Golunski, who was being treated for a minor shoulder injury he sustained during the evacuation, described the experience as “horrible,” detailing how “within a few minutes the boat was hit by a very strong wind and sank shortly afterward… (We were) terrified by the thunder, the lightning, the waves rocking our boat.”

She added that her family survived because they were on deck when the ship began to sink, rather than being trapped in the cabins below.

The five missing passengers are believed to have drowned there: Mike Lynch, his daughter Hannah, Jonathan Bloomer of Morgan Stanley and his wife, one of Lynch’s American lawyers, Christopher Morvillo of law firm Clifford Chance and Morvillo’s wife.

Lynch, 59, was once hailed as Britain’s technology king and is often referred to as “the British Bill Gates”.

In June, he was acquitted in a U.S. federal trial of fraud and conspiracy charges in connection with the $11 billion acquisition of his company, Autonomy Corp., by Hewlett Packard.

The hunting trip seemed to be a celebration of sorts after Lynch’s acquittal. Among the guests were members of his legal team, as well as friends, family and witnesses who had supported Lynch during the trial.