Cuba remained largely with out energy on Saturday morning, after the island nation’s grid collapsed the evening earlier than, knocking out electrical energy for 10 million individuals and elevating recent questions in regards to the viability of its antiquated producing system.
At dawn, the island’s grid operator UNE stated it was producing solely a trickle of electrical energy – round 225 MW, or lower than 10% of complete demand, sufficient to cowl some very important providers like hospitals, water provide and meals manufacturing facilities.
CUBA WORKING TO REESTABLISH ELECTRICAL SERVICE AFTER SECOND GRID COLLAPSE
Officers stated they’d begun the method of firing up the nation’s decades-old technology crops, however gave no timeline for restoring service.
Cuba´s grid failed Friday night round 8:15 p.m. (0015 GMT) after an getting old element of a transmission line at a substation in Havana shorted, starting a series response that utterly shut down energy technology throughout the island, UNE officers stated.
Folks stroll on the road throughout a nationwide electrical grid collapse, in Havana, Cuba, March 14, 2025. (REUTERS/Norlys Perez)
The grid collapse follows a string of nationwide blackouts late final 12 months that plunged Cuba’s frail energy producing system into near-total disarray, careworn by gasoline shortages, pure catastrophe and financial disaster.
Most Cubans exterior the nation’s capital of Havana have already been dwelling for months with rolling blackouts that peaked at 20 hours a day in latest weeks.
Havana was nonetheless largely with out electrical energy on Saturday morning. Gentle site visitors navigated intersections with no functioning stoplights and mobile web was weak or non-existent in some areas.
Abel Bonne chatted with pals on Havana’s Malecon waterfront boulevard early Saturday, taking within the recent sea breeze after a stuffy evening with out energy.
“Proper now, nobody is aware of when the facility will come again on,” he stated. “That is the primary time this had occurred this 12 months, however final 12 months it occurred 3 times.”
Extreme shortages of meals, drugs and water have made life more and more insufferable for a lot of Cubans, and other people have been fleeing the island in recent times in record-breaking numbers.
Cuba blames its financial woes on a Cold War-era U.S. commerce embargo, an online of legal guidelines and laws that complicate monetary transactions and the acquisition of necessities like gasoline and spare elements.
A grid official on Saturday morning stated Cuba had been unable to replace antiquated transmission and technology parts due to the restrictions.
U.S. President Donald Trump just lately tightened sanctions on the island’s communist-run authorities, vowing to revive a “powerful” coverage towards the long-time U.S. foe.
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Havana resident Yunior Reyes, a motorbike taxi driver, was again on the job Saturday morning regardless of the blackout, fretting that his meals reserves may spoil within the day’s warmth.
“We’re all in the identical state of affairs,” he stated. “It is a number of work.”
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