The president of Cuba, Miguel Díaz Canel, stated that the number of deaths due to the explosion of a gas tank at the Hotel Saratoga, in the heart of Havana, is 18, including a child and a pregnant woman, and that reported 50 injured adults hospitalized, of which 14 are minors
According to the latest data provided by the Cuban president at 6:00 p.m. Argentine time, “families whose homes were affected by the explosion are transferred to safe places” while recovery actions are carried out and “work continues to assess the state of the hotel structures and surrounding buildings”
“We are focused on caring for people, the relatives of the deceased and also those who are hospitalized,” Díaz-Canel said in the official account of the Cuban Presidency.
He also specified that the elementary school children who were affected “will be relocated to other educational institutions in the area, which will allow them to attend classes on Monday,” while praising the blood donations received and “the solidarity of several friendly countries.
Shortly after 11 local time (12 noon in Argentina), a “gas tank” exploded on one of the floors of the five-star hotel located on Dragones Street, in the center of Old Havana, a few meters from Paseo of the meadow.
The incident caused the death of at least 18 people while more victims continue to be sought by rescue teams. Meanwhile, another 50 were injured, of which 11 are “extremely serious,” said Miguel García, director of the Calixto García hospital, according to the official Twitter account of the Cuban Presidency.
An hour after the explosion occurred, the Cuban president went to the scene to “supervise the rescue and rescue efforts,” they detailed from the account and assured that “preliminary investigations indicate that the explosion was caused by a gas leak.”
“It was not a bomb or an attack, it was an unfortunate accident,” said Díaz-Canel, in front of the rubble of the luxury hotel in the Cuban capital.
Police personnel surrounded the place within a radius of two blocks to speed up the work of paramedics, ambulances and the five fire trucks involved in search and rescue tasks.
The Cuban president was also present at the Calixto García hospital, where more than twenty of the wounded were transferred, where he asked the health workers to “”beautiful yourself there, we have to save our people.”
Later, the president went to the Hermanos Ameijeras hospital where the rest of the wounded are to find out about their situation.
Meanwhile, staff from the Provincial Blood Bank, located on 23rd and 2nd streets, asked for blood donations to care for the wounded and organized themselves to speed up the process.
For his part, the provincial director of Health, Emilio Delgado Iznaga, confirmed that the health system in Havana is “fully active.”
a historic building
The Saratoga hotel building is a luxurious neoclassical construction located a few meters from the mythical Paseo del Prado, in the heart of Old Havana, It was built in 1880 for warehouses, remodeled and transformed into a hotel in 1933 and reopened in 2005.
He was currently closed for renovations and it had a reopening date on May 10, so construction personnel were working on the site at the time of the explosion.
The delegate of the state company Gaviota, owner of the hotel, Roberto Calzadilla, said that the explosion occurred when “the gas was being replenished with a pipe (tank truck), and apparently this was what caused this unfortunate accident,” reported the AFP agency.
The agency cited several witnesses to the incident, such as Rogelio García, a pedicab driver, who assured that “There was a tremendous noise and a cloud of dust that reached the park (opposite), many people ran out”.
“What you felt was a shocking explosion and all that fell apart,” said another woman who still had dust on her face and who did not want to identify herself.
As a result of the incident, several buildings adjoining the hotel were preventively closed, including a school where “all the children were evacuated and none were injured,” reported the Cuban presidency.
