14ymedio, Havana, August 7, 2024 — Amaury Miguel Suárez Torres and his stepfather were the only survivors of the shipwreck of a raft in which, along with nine other Cubans, they sailed on July 14 from La Coloma beach, in Pinar del Río, heading to the United States. Rescued by the Cuban authorities, both have third-degree burns and are receiving medical attention in a hospital in the province, influencer Niover Licea reported on social networks. The raft, according to Licea, “began to take on water” in the middle of the journey, but the crew members, mostly residents of the Alonso Rojas People’s Council, decided to continue. In the early hours of the same day, the boat crashed into a reef and the rafters fell into the sea.
Suárez Torres was traveling with his 20-year-old girlfriend Ana Elis Gázquez Vargas, whose lifeless body was found on July 30 on the coast of the town of Cortés, belonging to the municipality of Sandino. The young woman, originally from Consolación del Sur, died from dehydration. According to the forensic report, when they found her body she had already been dead for a week and was identified by her relatives thanks to her tattoos.
Gázquez’s mother had asked her not