Gas leak was the reason behind the blast at Havana hotel that killed 22

Gas leak was the reason behind the blast at Havana hotel that killed 22. 

On Friday, a fatal explosion ripped a wound several floors high in the side of a well-known hotel in downtown Havana, killing at least 22 people and injuring up to 70, according to witnesses and official media.

President Miguel Diaz-Canel, speaking on Cuban television from the scene, said the incident at the historic, high-end Hotel Saratoga looked to be caused by a gas leak.

As he departed the capital’s Calixto Garcia hospital, where several of the injured were treated, he later told Reuters, “In no case was it a bomb or an attack.” ‘It was just a really bad accident.”

Despite this, the bomb caused a brief panic in the historic old Havana area, slowly reopening to tourists after the pandemic hit the Caribbean island’s vital tourism economy.

Hundreds of Cubans and tourists congregated near the hotel under the scorching sun while police blocked off the area. As ambulances and rescue personnel took casualties from the ruins, many speculated about the cause of the bomb.

According to health officials, the explosion shook a nearby school with more than 300 pupils. According to the health ministry, at least 15 children had been hurt by late Friday evening, and one youngster had died.

According to initial reports, no tourists were killed or injured in the bomb, according to Cuba’s tourism minister, Juan Carlos Garcia.

According to state-run television, the hotel, housed in a more than century-old building, was closed. 

According to Roberto Enrique Calzadilla, only workers were inside at the time of the explosion, a representative of the military-run corporation that operates many of the country’s hotels.

Calzadilla stated in a radio interview that the 96-room hotel would reopen in the coming days and that personnel on-site were completing final preparations.

He also stated that the reason appeared to be a gas leak.

“The workmen were… performing all the work to open the property. They were resupplying the gas in the morning, and it appears that an accident caused an explosion,” he said.

The bomb engulfed the building and adjacent streets in black smoke and dust.

Some neighboring government buildings, including the famous Capitolio, or capital building, were soon cordoned off by police and rescue crews.

A snapshot from the scene shows at least one body with a white cloth draped over it. A man dragged a woman screaming in pain to a clinic a block from the explosion. In contrast, bystanders screamed for information about loved ones.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, a British company refurbished the neoclassical Saratoga Hotel, which was regarded as the place to stay by visiting government leaders and celebrities for many years.

It had recently lost some of its lusters due to the introduction of other hotels in Havana, but it was still a five-star establishment.