This is the dramatic moment a £14m superyacht caught fire and sunk off the coast of Sardinia.
Sixteen passengers and crew miraculously escaped from the Atina before it was completely engulfed in flames on Saturday evening whilst it was moored in the Gulf of Olbia.
The tourists, who were from Turkey, were collected by firefighters and coastguards. There were no reported injuries.
Among those on board is believed to be Serkan Borancili, who owned the 47-m-long vessel.
The Turkish entrepreneur co-founded the troubled grocery delivery app Getir in 2015, which was recently forced to exit both the European and US markets after a rapid expansion.
This is the dramatic moment a £14m superyacht owned by the founder of troubled grocery app Getir caught fire and sunk off the coast of Sardinia
Sixteen passengers and crew escaped from the Atina before it was completely engulfed in flames on Saturday evening whilst it was moored in the Gulf of Olbia
The tourists, who were from Turkey, were collected by firefighters and coastguards and there were no reported injuries
Footage released by the Olbia Coast Guard shows the multi-million-pound yacht sinking while being doused with an extinguisher in the port that has been dubbed ‘Billionaire’s Playground’.
It ended up on the seabed about 7m deep and local media has said that clean-up operations are currently underway.
The yacht was carrying around 50,000 litres of fuel but the Olbia Port Authority said no spills had been detected.
The fire is believed to have begun in the superyacht’s engine compartment but the cause of the blaze is currently being investigated.
The Atina was sold in 2021 for more than £14million and it won an award at the World Superyacht Awards in 2009.
It underwent an eight-month-long revamp when it was bought three years ago with the top deck completely redesigned.
The yacht was complete with five cabins, lounge areas and an entertainment system installed throughout.
The Atina was priced at €220,000 per week and operated in Corsica and the French Riviera, according to BOAT international.
Pictured: Serkan Borancili who co-founded the troubled grocery app Getir
Footage from the Olbia Coast Guard shows the yacht sinking while being doused with an extinguisher
Borancili co-founded Getir with Nazim Salur in 2015 and the company thrived during lockdown.
The business was once valued at £9.5 billion and has links to two Russian oligarchs, Vladimir Potanin and Arkady Volozh.
Earlier this year, Getir announced it will leave the UK, with an estimated 1,500 jobs to be lost.
The firm will also leave Europe and the US to focus solely on its home market in Turkey, bringing an end to its rapid expansion across the regions since the pandemic.
The announcement came after speculation that Getir’s UK and European operations were struggling financially, following its decision to pull out of Italy and Spain last year.
It said it now only makes about 7 per cent of its revenue outside of Turkey.
The incident involving Borancili’s yacht at the weekend comes after an Italian vessel started sinking off an idyllic Greek holiday island after a member of the crew left a side door open in July.
The 150ft mega yacht ‘Ethos’, setting renters back a whopping £180,000-a-week, was seen taking in water off the coast of Kefalonia while in the Paleokaravo Bay.
A luxury boat first got into trouble at around 10am local time on August 10 off the coast of Majorca
In footage posted by Majorca’s coast guard the yacht, which is valued at an eye-watering £800,000, can be seen listing on its stern with the bow of the vessel rising up above the water
The five tourists on board the yacht were safely rescued after it ran aground in Evretis Bay, where it was anchored.
Similarly a luxury yacht sunk off the coast of Majorca in August, prompting a dramatic rescue operation.
The luxury boat got into trouble at around 10am local time on August 10 when other ships noticed that it was partially submerged off the coast of Camp de Mar on the south west of the Balearic Island.
An emergency alert was issued shortly afterwards and the Spanish coast guard scrambled on its boats to head to the scene – with local police following behind.
Luckily, before emergency services could get there, a private boat was able to pick up the yacht’s five passengers- which included a German couple and their son.