Cuba: Exodus by Air

Almost 1,000 Cuban exiles milled anxiously about the lobby and observation platforms of Miami's International Airport. "Do you have someone coming over?" one Cuban asked another. The man crossed his fingers. "We wait. We hope. We pray," he said.

At 1:59 p.m., the waiting, the hoping, the praying was ended for a fortunate few in the crowd. A Pan American DC-7 taxied up the ramp after a 60-minute hop from the onetime Cuban resort town of Varadero, carrying the first planeload of refugees to leave Cuba under last month's air-evacuation agreement. Aboard were 75 passengers —15 men, 31 women, 29...

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