I saw a friend who just returned to Havana from Santiago de
Cuba. Told me the following:
"We were staying in the Melia Hotel in Santiago de Cuba the
night Sandy hit. The Melia is a
large, impressive hotel, so we felt pretty safe. But at three in the morning all hell broke loose. It was
like being in a hurricane, a tornado and an earthquake all at the same time.
We were on the 6th floor. The entire top floor, which I believe
was the 20th floor, was
an elegant bar / restaurant. The
wind rocked the building furiously. Debris continuously hit our windows and exterior walls. But
the worst part was that the building rocked to and fro. We could feel creaking
inside the walls, and we feared the building would collapse. But we didn’t know of anywhere to go to
feel safer. Obviously, we couldn’t take the elevator. But even if we went down the emergency stairs, we wouldn’t
be able to go outside when we got to the ground. The lobby could be as bad or worse, since it had large pane
glass windows, and if the building fell, it wouldn’t be any better to be on the
ground than on the 6th floor.
So we rode it out, petrified.
Suddenly, the whooshing wind, pounding rain and smashing
items seemed quiet next to another noise. It sounded like a huge explosion far
above us, and maybe more than one.
Then we heard more sounds of large objects banging into other things.
Outside the windows (which we shouldn’t have been looking out, but we were), we
saw large chairs, equipment and a piano falling to the earth, some banging the
building on the way.
“What happened,” I asked my wife?
“I think the roof must have come off. That seemed to come
from the restaurant on the top floor.”
The rocking became louder. More debris swirled around. The rain came harder again.
Then something new began to happen. It sounded like huge sewer pipes opened
in the walls. The sound of a huge
water flow passing down through the building overtook the sounds we heard
outside. Again, we worried the
building would come apart at the seams from the pressure of the water passing
downwards from the roof.
Eventually, things calmed. The building remained intact, at
least in the area of our floor. We
went down the exterior emergency stairwell, and found the glass that enclosed
it broken in many places. We were glad we hadn’t entered it in the nighttime,
and perhaps been sliced by flying glass.
Outside, it was unbelievable.
We realized that the roof hadn’t come off, but it might as well have
because the restaurant floor was gone.
Many other higher floors were also badly damaged.
We were able to see exposed girders and other interior
structures. It appeared to us that the hotel will
not be able to reopen for some time.
The interior damage is immense.
When we left Santiago, there was still no electricity in the area, and
thus no Internet. This is one of the few hotels that offers wi-fi. It obviously won't be for a while."
Here are photos of the hotel and surroundings.
Franklin Marquez.
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Stairwell |
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Top Floor Restaurant |
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See Top Floor Restaurant at Right |
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