See more Daily Mail on Google - save us as a Preferred SourceBy CHRISTOPHER STEVENS, TV CRITIC Published: 22:58 BST, 22 June 2026 | Updated: 02:16 BST, 23 June 2026
Millionaire Superyacht: Why Ships Sink (BBC2)Rating: Two out of five stars What are the chances? Two super-rich entrepreneurs win a court battle over a multi-billion-dollar business dispute — but, weeks later, they die one day apart in bizarre, unrelated accidents. The odds must be astronomical (and, to make it stranger still, their company specialised in analysing probability).Most inexplicable of all, the BBC has managed to make an hour-long documentary about one of the fatal accidents... without so much as mentioning the other death, the court case or the tangle of coincidences.Millionaire Superyacht: Why Ships Sink left out so many key facts about the sinking of the Bayesian one stormy night in August 2024, it verged on wilful evasion. It alluded to a maelstrom of accusations, counter-accusations and conspiracy theories, but made no attempt to explain why the tragedy, which left seven people dead, was so contentious.In fact, one of those who died was Mike Lynch, a tech tycoon dubbed 'the British Bill Gates'. Among the other casualties were Lynch's lawyer Chris Morvillo and his wife, Neda, and his close friend, banker Jonathan Bloomer, along with wife Judy. Lynch's 18-year-old daughter Hannah and their chef, Recaldo Thomas, also lost their lives.Though we weren't told this, the party were celebrating a legal victory after Lynch was acquitted in a long-running fraud case. Quite incredibly, on the night the Bayesian sank off Sicily in freak hurricane conditions, Lynch's co-defendant Stephen Chamberlain was fighting for his life in a Cambridge hospital after being hit by a car. He died a day later.So convoluted and improbable as to defy belief, the story deserves a full series to unravel it. But this film, directed by Rosemary Cafferkey, chose to ignore the background, and concentrated solely on the mechanics of how the yacht sank.Part of the problem, obvious to anyone who played with toy boats as a child, was the Bayesian's ridiculous design. Its mast was 237ft tall, 30 per cent longer than the yacht itself. This raised its centre of gravity, making it more prone to tip over. Millionaire Superyacht: Why Ships Sink left out so many key facts about the sinking of the Bayesian one stormy night in August 2024, it verged on wilful evasionOne of the talking heads told us that ships capsize when they lean beyond their 'angle of vanishing stability'. There's a touch of the Dave Allens about that elegant phrase: 'I am not inebriated, officer . . . I have merely attained my angle of vanishing stability.' Acting test of the night: House Of The Dragon (Sky Atlantic) returned, with incredible CGI and dialogue not just wooden but wattle-and-daub. Well done to Matthew Needham, as Lord Larys, for saying the line, 'These are dark hours but brighter days lie ahead,' without laughing. But the crucial factor, not revealed until several other theories had been tested and discarded, was a simple one. The engines were running, which meant vents in the hull were open.When the Bayesian rolled beyond 43 degrees, seawater flooded through these vents, sinking it within three minutes.Trapped in their cabins, several of the victims did not drown, but instead suffocated as air pockets were used up — a gruesome detail the documentary also omitted.It's a grimly fascinating story. But there seems little point in telling only part of it.
