
The crash of an airplane in Cuba is 68 deaths
ATR 72 linking Santiago de Cuba, in the East of the country, with the Cuban airliner crashed Thursday in the centre of the island of the Caribbean. Sixty-one passengers and 7 crew members were on board: forty Cuban, 17 Latin American countries, including nine Argentines, seven Mexican and a Venezuelan, and ten Europeans, including three Dutch nationals, a Frenchman, a Spanish, two Austrians, two German, Italian, and Japanese.
"Is there were no survivors", said the website Cuban official Cubadebate.cu. The website known to publish notes of former President Fidel Castro, made the announcement without further comment by publishing "list of people who died in the crash of the ATR 72-212".
883 Public company Aerocaribbean flight had reported about 5.30 p.m. hour local (23 h 30 French time) of an "emergency", less than an hour after its takeoff Santiago weather due to advance in this part of the Caribbean of storm tropical Tomas, reported the Cuban national television, citing a civil aviation Institute release. The wreckage of the aircraft in flames and scattered pieces lies in the midst of a difficult Bush access.
Residents have rushed to the scene of the crash to help rescue teams who tried in vain to find survivors. A commission was created "to investigate this lamentable accidents" and find the causes, according to the Cuban civil aviation Institute who pointed out that the aircraft had taken off in bad weather.
ALERT
Cuban journalists on-site however indicated that in the central region of Cuba, where the aircraft crashed the temperature was at fixed beauty.
State of alert was however declared Thursday night in the eastern region of Cuba as a result of the advance of its coastal storm tropical Tomas and all flights departing or going to Santiago de Cuba had been suspended at the end of the day.
The last crash Cuban airplane on the island dates back to March 2002. Airplane Antonov-2, which was between the city of Cienfuegos (centre) and resort in Cayo Coco (centre), shuttle crashed, killing 16 people on board, including six Canadian tourists, four British and two German.
The deadliest crash over the last thirty years of a Cuban airliner occurred in September 1989 in Havana. An Ilyushin Il-62 destined for Milan crashed shortly after its take-off, killing its inhabitants, including 113 Italian and 40 tourists killed on the ground by the fall of the apparatus Cubans 115.
The storm tropical Tomas, who made 14 dead in its passage on the island of Saint Lucia, should be strengthened in the next few hours and almost reaching hurricane strength when it will affect the West coast of Haiti on the night of Thursday to Friday.