Cubans struggle with an extended power outage and a new tropical storm

HAVANA (AP) — Many Cubans waited in anguish and some took to the streets in protest as widespread blackouts stretched into their third day. Their concerns were heightened as a Hurricane Oscar hit Cuba’s eastern coast with winds and heavy rain.

In Santo Suárez, part of a populous neighborhood in southwestern Havana, people went into the streets banging pots and pans in protest Sunday night. “We haven’t had electricity for three nights, and our food is rotting. Four days without electricity is an abuse to the children,” resident Mary Karla, a mother of three children, told The Associated Press. She didn’t give her surname. The protesters, who say they have no water either, blocked the street with garbage.

Energy Minister Vicente de la O Levy said in a news conference he hopes the electricity grid will be restored on Monday or Tuesday morning. But he said that Oscar, which made landfall on the eastern coast Sunday evening, will bring “an additional inconvenience” to Cuba’s recovery since it will touch a “region of strong (electricity) generation.” Key Cuban power plants, such as Felton in the city of Holguín, and Renté in Santiago de Cuba, are located in the area. Oscar later weakened to a tropical storm but its effects were forecast to linger in the island through Monday.

Some neighborhoods had electricity restored in Cuba’s capital, where 2 million people live, but most of Havana remained dark. The impact of the blackout goes beyond lighting, as services like water supply also depend on electricity to run pumps. People resorted to cooking with improvised wood stoves on the streets before the food went bad in refrigerators. In tears, Ylenis de la Caridad Napoles, mother of a 7-year-old girl, says she is reaching a point of “desperation.”