Italy luxury yacht victims died of ‘dry drowning,’ first autopsies show

Initial autopsies of four of the seven victims who died when a superyacht sank in a storm in Italy last month show they died of “dry drowning,” according to authorities.

• The phenomenon, also known as “atypical drowning,” means they had no water in their lungs, tracheas or stomachs, said a spokesperson for the lawyer of the captain of the Bayesian, which went down off the coast of the Sicilian port of Porticello on August 19.
• There is no medically accepted “dry drowning” condition — “dry drowning” or other terms such as secondary drowning or delayed drowning are sometimes used to describe patients whose condition worsened after a drowning rescue or who had very little water in the lungs...