At least 27 dead in wake of Havana hotel explosion as search for victims continues

INA-  sources 

Relatives of the missing in Cuba's capital desperately searched on Saturday for victims of an explosion at one of Havana's most luxurious hotels that killed at least 27 people. They checked the morgue, hospitals and, if unsuccessful, returned to the partially collapsed Hotel Saratoga, where rescuers used dogs to hunt for survivors.

A natural gas leak was the apparent cause of Friday's blast at Havana's 96-room Hotel Saratoga.

The 19th-century structure in the city's Old Havana neighbourhood did not have any guests at the time because it was undergoing renovations ahead of a planned Tuesday reopening after being closed for two years during the pandemic.

On Saturday evening, Dr. Julio Guerra Izquierdo, chief of hospital services at the Ministry of Health, raised the death toll to 27 with 81 people injured. The dead included four children and a pregnant woman. Spain's President Pedro Sanchez said via Twitter that a Spanish tourist was among the dead and that another Spaniard was seriously injured.

Cuban authorities confirmed the tourist's death and said her partner was injured. They were not staying at the hotel. Dalila Gonzalez, a spokesperson for the Tourism Ministry, said a Cuban-American tourist was also injured.
Representatives of Grupo de Turismo Gaviota SA, which owns the hotel, said during a Saturday news conference that 51 workers had been inside the hotel at the time, as well as two people working on renovations. Of those, 11 were killed, 13 remained missing and six were hospitalized.
Gonzalez said the cause of the blast was still under investigation, but a large crane hoisted a charred gas tanker from the hotel's rubble early Saturday.

Ongoing search effort

Search-and-rescue teams worked through the night and into Saturday, using ladders to descend through the rubble and twisted metal into the hotel's basement as heavy machinery gingerly moved away piles of the building's facade to allow access.

Above, chunks of drywall dangled from wires, and desks sat seemingly undisturbed inches from the void where the front of the building cleaved away.

At least one survivor was found early Saturday in the shattered ruins of the hotel, and rescuers using search dogs clambered over huge chunks of concrete looking for more. Relatives of missing people remained at the site while others gathered at hospitals where the injured were being treated.