Cuba faces repeated power outages as electrical grid fails twice
Cuba went through two major blackouts in less than a day. The island nation first lost power on Friday‚ with a brief recovery before another total outage early Saturday. Officials blame various factors for the ongoing energy crisis
Cuba experienced a double whammy of power outages recently‚ leaving its population in the dark. The first blackout hit on Friday (10/18/24) affecting over 10 million people‚ when one of the countrys main power plants broke down.
The government had to send workers home and cancel school classes to save energy. As night fell some areas started getting power back‚ giving people hope. But their relief was short-lived.
Early Saturday morning (10/19/24) at 6:15 AM‚ the whole system crashed again. The national power company UNE‚ said they were working to fix it but didnt give details on why it happened or how long it would take.
Cubaʼs been dealing with power problems for weeks now with blackouts lasting 10 to 20 hours a day in many places. The government says its because of:
- Old equipment thats falling apart
- Not enough fuel
- More people using electricity
Hurricane Milton which hit earlier this month‚ made things worse. It made it hard to get fuel from ships to power plants.
Cubaʼs also getting less fuel from other countries. Venezuela‚ Russia and Mexico used to send a lot‚ but now theyre sending less. Venezuela cut its cheap fuel shipments to Cuba by half this year‚ so Cuba has to buy more expensive fuel elsewhere.
The Cuban government also points fingers at the U.S. They say the trade rules and sanctions from when Trump was president make it hard to get fuel and parts to fix power plants.
But the U.S. said on Friday (10/18/24) that its not responsible for Cubaʼs power problems
