Havana hotel explosion kills nine and leaves 40 injured
A POWERFUL explosion rocked Havana last night, killing at least nine people, injuring more than 40 and destroying a five-star hotel.
Flames and smoke billowed out of the Hotel Saratoga in Old Havana as rescue teams searched for more than a dozen people who were feared to be trapped.
The 96-room hotel is one of the most famous in Havana and a retreat for government officials and celebrities. Beyoncé, Madonna and the King of Morocco have stayed there.
Construction work had been taking place at the hotel, which had been set for a post-pandemic reopening in four days’ time, according to local reports.
The explosion shone a light on Cuba’s woeful building safety record.
Some 3,856 partial or total building collapses were reported in Havana from 2000 to 2013, excluding 2010 and 2011 when no records were kept. In January 2020, three children were killed in a balcony collapse, and in 2015 an apartment collapse killed four people.
Cuba’s Communist government, strapped for cash in the face of a decades-old US trade embargo and an inefficient economy, has prioritised healthcare and education spending. Buildings, faced with salty sea air, high humidity and hurricanes, have not been given the same funding.
Hours after the explosion, Miguel Díaz-canel, Cuba’s president, visited the scene and said the devastation was not the result of a bomb attack. Initial investigations point to a gas leak.
Yesterday, videos showed rescuers pulling a woman from under a pile of rubble. Shrapnel and debris flew more than 100 yards down the street, locals said. Mr Díaz-canel has visited the Hermanos Ameijeiras hospital, where some of the injured are being treated.
In a statement last night, Mr Diazcanel said: “Compatriots and friends from all over the world, Havana is in shock today following the accidental explosion of a gas tank at Hotel Saratoga, causing much of the building to collapse.
“So far, nine deaths and 40 injuries have been reported.”
He added that he was “moved” by the “immediate response of students and young people from the capital who have donated blood for the injured.”
Luis Antonio Torres Iríbar, the first secretary of the Communist Party, last night said 13 people are still missing.
Police and fire crews arrived at the Paseo del Prado just after 11am.
Michel Figueroa, a photographer, said he had been walking past the hotel when “the explosion threw me to the ground, and my head still hurts.”
Yazira de la Caridad, a mother of two, said the explosion shook her home a block from the hotel: “The building moved. I thought it was an earthquake.”
Andres Manuel López Obrador, Mexico’s president, did not plan to cancel tomorrow’s trip to Cuba, according to Marcelo Ebrard, Mexico’s foreign minister. He tweeted: “Our solidarity to the victims and affected, as well as to the people of that dear brotherly people.”
The Hotel Saratoga has a neoclassical facade and is said to have been remodelled by a British company after the fall of the Soviet Union.