An inquest into the deaths of a married Kent couple who died after a superyacht sunk has opened.

Jonathan Bloomer, 70, and Judy Bloomer, 71, were two of eight people who died after the Bayesian sank off the coast of Sicily in August.

The Sevenoaks couple were onboard with 20 others, including billionaire Mike Lynch, 59, his daughter Hannay Lynch, 17, who both died in the incident. Their bodies were the first discovered, the court was told, on August 21.

US lawyer Chris Morvillo and his wife Neda Morvillo, and Canadian-Antiguan national Recaldo Thomas, who was working as a chef on the vessel, were also killed in the disaster.

An inquest opened today into the death of the Bloomers and the Lynches.

Tycoon Mike Lynch’s cause of death was given as drowning, while the cause of death for Morgan Stanley international bank chairman Jonathan Bloomer and his wife hasn’t been established yet.

However, a date and time of death was given of around 5am on August 19 after they were “lost at sea” following the sinking of the Bayesian just under a mile off the coast of Porticello.

The inquest was opened at Suffolk Coroner’s Court in Ipswich and adjourned until a later date.

Suffolk Police Detective Superintendent Michael Brown said the cause of death for the other three was still under investigation.

He said further testing was required to establish their cause of death, which is not unusual following the initial post-mortem, which was the equivalent of a Home Office post-mortem in the UK.

The boat trip was a celebration of Mr Lynch's acquittal in a US trial in June over allegations he carried out a massive fraud over the sale of Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard (HP) in 2011.

The yacht "sank rapidly" between 4.15 and 4.45am for reasons which are "yet to be ascertained", the inquest heard.

An investigation has been started by the UK's Marine Accident Investigation Branch, while the Italian authorities have opened their own criminal probe.