Owner of doomed Dominican Republic nightclub speaks out as death toll rises to 184
The owner of the doomed Dominican Republic nightclub has broken his silence as the death toll has risen to 184 following the building’s nightmare roof collapse.
Antonio Espaillat, owner of Jet Set nightclub in Santo Domingo, revealed that he was out of the country when tragedy struck while popular merengue singer Rubby Pérez was performing late Tuesday.
Espaillat said he has returned to Santo Domingo to “cooperate with the authorities in rescue and investigation.”
“There are not enough words to express the pain this event generates,” Espaillat said in an Instagram video on Wednesday, translated by local outlet Dominican Today.
“What happened has been devastating for everyone. We want you to know that we are with you and that we share your grief.”
Espaillat added that the nightclub’s management team is “in constant communication” with officials while search and rescue work continues.
The businessman thanked President Luis Abinader for visiting the scene of the tragedy, saying “his presence at the scene was a clear gesture of solidarity.”
“Today, more than ever, we are a family,” Espaillat concluded his video.
President Abinader has since declared three days of national mourning following the devastating incident.
Juan Manuel Méndez, the director of the Emergency Operations Center, said Thursday that at least 184 people had died in the accident. Mendez also stressed that it was a “preliminary figure.”
Mendez told a news conference that “until we have combed through everything, we are not going to abandon nobody.”
“We will be here until we have recovered everyone, dead or alive,” he said, adding that no survivors had been found under the rubble since Tuesday afternoon.
Elsewhere, the president’s spokesperson Homero Figueroa said, “There will be a transition from a search and rescue phase to the recovery of the bodies phase” in the coming hours.
More than 20 of the estimated 150 people injured in the accident remain hospitalized, including at least eight in critical condition, officials said.
Among the confirmed dead are several former athletes, including former World Series champion Octavio Dotel and former Major League baseball player Tony Blanco, father of current Pittsburgh Pirates prospect Tony Blanco Jr.
Dotel, who started as a Mets prospect and won a ring with the St. Louis Cardinals in 2011, and Blanco Sr., who played briefly for the Washington Nationals, died shortly after the roof caved in.
Nelsy Cruz, the governor of Montecristi, was also among the dead, authorities said. Cruz is the sister of former major league slugger Nelson Cruz.
On Wednesday, Boston Red Sox pitching icon Pedro Martinez said he has unaccounted-for family members who were inside the nightclub when the roof collapsed.
“I still have family members that are still in the [rubble] and we don’t know what happened to them but we just want to be strong, like we have always been,” Martinez said in an Instagram post.
“I hope we can all unite and pray … that our families can be found,” he added in Spanish.
An investigation into what caused the nightclub’s ceiling to collapse is ongoing.
With Post wires
