MELBOURNE, June 7 (UPI) -- Two men involved in the building of an Australian racing yacht that sank in 2002 face manslaughter charges.
Alex Cittadini was the director and engineer at Applied Alloy Yachts in Melbourne, where the Excalibur was built, The Daily Telegraph reported. Adrian Presland, a welder, worked on the keel, which split, causing the yacht to capsize.
Four members of the crew died -- Christopher Heyes, 51, Ann Maree Pope, 30, Tracy Luke, 32, and Peter McLeod, 51.
The bodies of Pope, Luke and McLeod were never found.
The captain, Brian McDermott, and another member of the crew, John Rogers, survived several hours in rough seas.
Alan Saunders, the Excalibur's owner, sailed from Sydney to Hamilton Island with the crew but did not make the return trip. He said Friday he was relieved the case was coming to a head.
"You get some bad phone calls in your life, and that was the worst call of a lifetime," he said.
A coroner's inquest recommended criminal charges in 2005. Witnesses at the inquest said Excalibur was Cittadini's "pet project."
