Tuesday, July 6, 2010

READER QUESTION ON CUBA...

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In some ways, yes, Cuba would be a better spot. It's a huge island with lots of room to roam. It's also much more lush and fertile than the coral islands of the Bahamas, so it's much easier to find food. You could easily live off mangoes and bananas supplemented with some fresh-caught fish along with swiped eggs since many people there raise chickens.

If a fugitive with a similar m.o. wanted to go unnoticed, though, and didn't want to live in the forests, he’d have a tough time because there aren’t the selection of vacant vacation homes in Cuba that you find in the Bahamas or almost any other Caribbean destination.

Cuba has maintained draconian real estate laws since la revolution in 1959. That applies to locals as well as foreigners. Only now are they so strapped for cash that they’re about to allow foreigners to develop golf course communities that will eventually include lots of large, opulent vacation villas. They won’t be ready for years, though.

Right now, any foreigner acting furtively in Cuba would very quickly be picked up. A fat bank account might allow you to make a deal and stay there (a la Robert Vesco during a different part of his run), but I don’t think Colt has that kind of baksheesh to spread around.

All of that is moot, though, if any fugitive tried to make it to Cuba in an airplane. While there have been five small private planes stolen and flown around with impunity here in the States during all this, Cuba keeps an extremely close watch on its airspace and has actually shot down private planes that entered without permission.

By boat? Maybe… the Cuban navy is just as serious about smuggling, though, and would likely intercept a boat.

But there are some hints that Colt’s been studying a foreign language, maybe Spanish… so anything’s possible.

Again, there is no evidence that I know that says this is Colton Harris-Moore who stole the plane from Indiana and splash landed it in the Bahamas… these are just all “what ifs” at this point.
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1 comment:

  1. What makes you think he has been studying a foreign language? Thanks for the updates!

    ReplyDelete