Cuban rescuers continued Saturday to search for possible survivors in the rubble of the Saratoga Hotel, an emblematic establishment in Havana blown up the day before by a powerful explosion that killed at least 25 people, including a Spanish tourist.
The previous report, released Friday evening, reported 22 dead, including a child, and more than fifty injured in this explosion, probably due to a gas leak. State television said Saturday morning that the death toll now stands at 25.
“Tragic news comes to us from Cuba,” Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez tweeted.
Nos llegan trágicas noticias desde Cuba. Una turista española ha fallecido y otro ciudadano español está herido de gravedad tras la explosión del hotel Saratoga.
Todo nuestro cariño para sus familias y las de todas las víctimas y heridos. Nuestro apoyo también al pueblo cubano.
— Pedro Sanchez (@sanchezcastejon) May 7, 2022
“A Spanish tourist has died and another Spanish citizen is seriously injured after the Saratoga hotel explosion. All our affection to the families and to all the victims and injured. All our support also for the Cuban people,” he added.
Located a stone’s throw from the famous Capitol, seat of the National Assembly, the Saratoga is an emblem of Old Havana with its recognizable green facade and its image as a star hotel – it has notably hosted Mick Jagger, Beyoncé and Madonna.
But on Saturday morning, it displayed its gutted carcass, the first four floors having been blown away by the explosion.
After the evacuation of a large part of the surrounding debris, the search now focused on the interior of the building, in particular the entrance hall as well as the 5th and 6th floors of the hotel, noted a journalist from I’France Media Agency.
Canine brigades and teams of rescuers carrying tools for detecting possible survivors were also trying to access the basement, from where a woman had issued a call for help on Friday afternoon.
“Solidarity”
“What happened is very regrettable, the destruction, especially the loss of life, and also the injured people, but once again I want to highlight the speed with which the population and the institutions mobilized”, wrote on Twitter President Miguel Diaz-Canel.
Es muy lamentable lo ocurrido, la destrucción, sobre todo las pérdidas de vidas, y también las personas lesionadas, pero una vez más quiero destacar la rapidez con que se movilizaron la población y las institutions. Ha primado la solidarity. #FuerzaCubahttps://t.co/Q4bd4WCdVP
— Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez (@DiazCanelB) May 7, 2022
“It was solidarity that prevailed,” he added as many Cubans rushed on Friday to donate blood and thus come to the aid of the wounded.
Residents of neighboring homes damaged by the blast were evacuated as a precaution to accommodation centers, the television said.
Under construction, the Saratoga hotel had been closed to tourists for two years due to the pandemic.
Only workers and employees were inside preparing for its reopening, scheduled for May 10.
Built in 1880 to house shops, the neoclassical building was transformed into a hotel in 1933 and renovated into a luxury establishment in 2005, classified 5 stars with its 96 rooms, two restaurants and swimming pool on the roof.
The first elements indicate that a gas leak during a refueling operation by a tanker truck was the cause of the explosion, which occurred on Friday around 11:00 a.m. (3:00 p.m. GMT).
“It was neither a bomb nor an attack, it was a regrettable accident,” said President Miguel Diaz-Canel on Friday, who arrived on the spot shortly after, thus wanting to put an end to rumors on social networks which evoked the bombings in several hotels in the 1990s, ordered by Cuban exiles.
On Friday, the United States, Canada, the European Union and Venezuela in particular expressed their condolences to the Cuban authorities.
“Our thanks to the governments, organizations, friends and all those who, from different parts of the world, expressed, in this moment of pain, their solidarity with our people and the relatives of the victims of the tragic accident at the Saratoga Hotel”, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez tweeted on Saturday.