According to Pierre Achkar, the owner of the Monroe Hotel and president of the Lebanese Hotel Owners Syndicate, the bomb that killed former prime minister, Rafik Hariri, cost of the hotel district more than $60 million. But, it was the sight of panic-stricken guests fleeing to the airport (in some case not even waiting to pack) that sent a shiver down the spine.
That said, there were some losses that could not be replaced at Lebanon’s own Ground Zero. The St. George’s club lost five employees in the attack, and had an additional 15 employees wounded, five seriously.
The loss of life aside, it was everyone’s nightmare. “Beyond the external damage, you also have the water pipes, the gas pipes, the fire system, a whole number of things – assessing all of this is a big project which takes time,” commented the manager of the Monroe Hotel, who assessed the total costs incurred by the physical damages to the hotel at over $1 million.
Elsewhere, hotel executives who had worked hard to drum up trade on the back of Lebanon’s tourist revival were not impressed. It had become almost personal. “I just got back from Egypt, where I had worked hard to shore up business guests, and I was happy because all these groups had booked with us,” seethed Nada Ghawi, spokeswoman for the InterContinental Le Vendôme, which had an 80% occupancy rate prior to the incident, commented. “Now they have all cancelled. This whole thing makes me so angry.”
The majority of the hotels are likely to have to bear the brunt of the costs themselves because they have not taken the premium insurance policy that protects businesses against acts of political violence and terrorism.
“To my knowledge, the only hotel that is covered is the Phoenicia, which is protected by InterContinental’s global coverage,” said Fateh Bekdache, general manager at Arope Insurance. “It is very rare for hotels to have [this level of insurance] in Lebanon – the policy is too expensive for them, especially in such a tight market.”
Others pinned their hopes on assistance from the government. “Our hotel needs to be entirely renovated, just like it had to be after the civil war,” said Joseph Hanna, the auditor of the Beverly Residence Hotel. “Our insurance has told us it doesn’t cover such incidents. The government should consider us victims, as we were after the war, and reimburse us, so we can restart our businesses again.”
In the meantime, staff members were being put on annual leave. “Security, housekeeping, and engineering are being kept, but the rest of staff has been put on annual leave,” said the hotel manager of the Monroe Hotel. “Keeping them here would only depress them.”
Equally affected were the shops and restaurants surrounding site of the explosion. Within hours of the blast, Rafik Khazen, the owner representative of Awtar restaurant on the ground floor of the Monroe Hotel, was already overseeing the clearing up of his heavily damaged venue. “All the windows are broken, the ceiling is damaged, as is our kitchen,” he said, standing amid the debris. “We’re looking at a minimum of $20,000 to $25,000 in damages here. It makes me feel bad when I see this, because we are a popular restaurant. Now we won’t be opening for weeks.”
Down the road, the employees of the Bassoul Heneine car dealership were also hard at work, with the firm intention of re-opening fast. “We’re working every day from eight to eight, Monday through Sunday to rebuild the shop so we can re-open as soon as possible,” said Henri Nawar, a sales manager. “The store was badly damaged: all the windows were broken, the ceiling, the lighting, the fixtures, the phone lines. The cars were also scratched up and had windows broken.”
