"I thought that it was odd that the crew said that they were reefing the main when the storm hit and that
the first gust shredded the main. Then they said that the boat started to go over after that. Go over under just the Jib?"
A similar incident happened in South Africa last year, at the Vaal Dam (Inland waters, not coastal.)
2 Dragonfly trimarans were out sailing under full rig in about 25 knots when the wind started to gust eratically, the skipper of the boat that didn`t capsize reported gusts of up to 40 knots.
As the wind started building, the mainsail on one boat tore in half across the middle, from leech to luff. The crew then took the main down while still sailing under full genoa. The next gust powered up the genoa and drove the nose of the boat off the wind, since there was no main up to balance the force in the genoa.
Before the crew had time to react, the genoa had driven the boat off the wind, powered up & capsized the boat.
So if the trimaran in the incident you describe was experiencing 70mph gusts, this may very well be what happened to them, even under a stormjib, with no main up they could have experienced the same difficulty.
Regarding safety procedures that they did or did not follow, isn`t hindsight a wonderful thing ? It takes out the potential for anything to go wrong.
They may have been in control & relaxed one minute, next thing they`re upside-down, wondering where all the emergency gear is.
Sure, all the precautions should, or could, have been taken, but how often do we all sail without all the necessary safety precautions, for example :
I have a set of flares, but seldom sail with them since I sail on inland waters. I once hit a submerged log about 10 miles from home base. If my boat had been holed, it would have been a long swim back to shore & a long walk home, if I was lucky.