A powerful explosion, apparently caused by a natural gas leak on Friday, killed eight people and injured at least 40 when it blew up the exterior walls of a five-star hotel in the heart of the Cuban capital.
The 96-room Saratoga Hotel has not hosted tourists as it is under renovation, Havana Governor Reynaldo Garcia Zapata told the Communist Party’s Granma newspaper.
“This is not a bomb or an attack. This is a tragic incident,” President Miguel Diaz-Canel, who visited the site, tweeted. The blast came as Cuba struggled to revive its key tourism sector, which had been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic and had been negatively affected by the war in Ukraine.
Cuban National Health Minister Jose Angel Portal told the Associated Press that hospitals have received about 40 injured, but said the number could rise as demand for people who may be trapped among the wreckage of the 19-nation structure century in Havana’s Old Havana neighborhood.
The Granma newspaper reported that local authorities said 13 people were unaccounted for. An elementary school near the hotel was evacuated and local media reported that no children were injured.
The newspaper reported that local authorities reported 13 people missing and about 30 known injured.
“I thought it was an earthquake”
The photos show that much of the hotel’s exterior wall has been blown away, revealing the interior rooms, with clouds of dust rising in the sky. A school next door was evacuated.
Police cordoned off the area while firefighters and ambulance crews worked inside.
Rescuers are working to clear the rubble after the explosion at the Saratoga Hotel in Havana. Authorities said the hotel was under renovation. (Adalberto Roque / AFP / Getty Images)
Photographer Michel Figueroa said he was walking past the hotel when “the explosion threw me to the ground and my head still hurts … It was all very fast.”
Yazira de la Caridad said the blast shook her home one block from the hotel.
“The whole building has moved. I thought it was an earthquake,” she said. “I still hold my heart in my hand.”
Maye Perez said she rushed to the scene after receiving a call from her husband, Daniel Serra, who works at a currency exchange store at the hotel. She said he told her, “I’m fine, I’m fine. They took us out, ”but she has not been able to contact him since.
The 96-star five-star hotel in Old Havana has two bars, two restaurants and a rooftop pool, according to its website.
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