Cuba has endured one of its toughest weeks in years after a nationwide blackout which left around 10 million Cubans without power for several days. Adding to the Caribbean island’s problems, Hurricane Oscar left a trail of destruction along the north-eastern coast, leaving several dead and causing widespread damage. For some communities in Cuba the energy crisis is the new normal.
As Cuba approached its fourth day without power this week, Yusely Perez turned to the only fuel source left available to her: firewood.
Her neighbourhood in Havana hasn’t received its regular deliveries of liquified gas cannisters for two months. So once the island’s entire electrical grid went down, prompting a nationwide blackout, Yusely was forced to take desperate measures.
(The government said) Normal service would be resumed soon, the Cuban minister insisted. But no sooner did he utter those words than there was another total collapse of the grid, the fourth in 48 hours.
Marbeyis Aguilera the 28-year-old mother-of-three is getting used to living without electricity.
For Marbeyis, even “normal service” being restored still means most of the day without power. In fact, what the residents of Havana endured for a few days is what daily life is like in her village of Aguacate in the province of Artemisa, outside Havana. “We’ve had no power for six days”, she says, brewing coffee on a makeshift charcoal stove inside her breeze-block, tin-roofed shack.
“It came on for a couple of hours last night and then went out again. We have no choice but to cook like this or use firewood to provide something warm for the children,” she adds. Her two gas hobs and one electric ring sit idle on the kitchen top, the room filling with smoke. The community is in dire need of state assistance, she says, listing their most urgent priorities. “First, electricity. Secondly, we need water. Food is running out. People with dollars, sent from abroad, can buy food. But we don’t have any so we can’t buy anything.” “It’s especially hard on the children”, Marbeyis adds, her eyes tearing up, “because when they say I want this or that, we have nothing to give them.”
Amid it all, on the north-eastern coast, the situation got even worse. As people were still coping with the blackout, Hurricane Oscar made landfall, bringing high winds, flash flooding and ripping roofs from homes. The storm may have passed. But Cubans know that such is the precarious state of the island’s energy infrastructure that the next nationwide blackout could come at any time.
Source: Cubans endure days without power as energy crisis hits hard
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