Authorities in Cuba say they are slowly restoring electricity to the eastern half of the island after the entire country lost power when Hurricane Rafael knocked out the electrical grid.
Ten million people were left in the dark on Wednesday after the storm tore through the island with winds hitting 185 kilometres per hour (115 miles per hour), damaging homes, uprooting trees and toppling telephone poles.
The Energy and Mines Ministry said on Thursday it was making progress restoring power in parts of eastern and central Cuba but warned it would take longer in western parts of the island that were hit hardest by the hurricane.
The capital, Havana, home to two million people, was still without power late on Thursday.
After the passage of the Category 3 storm overnight, Rafael lost intensity as it entered the Gulf of Mexico, according to the United States National Hurricane Center (NHC).
Forecasters warned Rafael’s maximum sustained winds of 185km/h (115mph) could bring “life-threatening” storm surges, winds and flash floods to Cuba, a nation highly vulnerable to bad weather due to its older, poorly maintained housing and public infrastructure.
Residents of Havana emerged from their homes to inspect the damage and found streets relatively dry after Rafael ended up cutting through the island about 60km (40 miles) west of the city, affecting Cuba’s internationally renowned tobacco-growing region in the provinces of Artemisa and Pinar del Rio.
Farmers had acted to protect stored tobacco leaves in the area as well as ripening fruits and vegetables, Agriculture Minister Ydael Perez Brito said.
The streets of Havana were deserted on Thursday. Most businesses and schools were closed, and transport services slowly got back up and running.
Authorities grounded flights at both Havana’s Jose Marti international airport and the popular beach resort of Varadero.Jose Ignacio Dimas returned home from his night shift as a security guard to find his Havana apartment building, in the historic centre of the city, had collapsed.
“The entire front wall of the building fell,” Dimas told The Associated Press news agency, as he scanned the damage. Like many buildings in the capital, it was ageing and lacked regular maintenance.
The office of Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said it was mobilising the military to help respond to the storm.
“Measures have been taken in each place to protect our people and material resources. As we have always done since the revolution, we will overcome this situation,” it said.
But many Cubans were left with a gloomy sense of deja vu, lacking confidence in the ability of the cash-strapped communist government to provide essential services, such as food and electricity, due to its poor economic relations with its closest neighbour, the United States, and the limited resources of its socialist allies, such as Venezuela, which is mired in its own political and economic crisis.
“I am desperate, I am homeless. The roof is gone and I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Marta Leon Castro, 57, told the AFP news agency. At least five families in her neighbourhood had lost all or part of their roofs.
“All the chicken and pork I bought is going to get ruined in the fridge if we don’t get power back soon,” Giovanny Fardales, a professional translator in Havana said.
Barely two weeks ago, the island was hit by a similar power outage caused by problems with its ageing, oil-fired thermoelectric power stations.That was followed by Hurricane Oscar a few days later, causing major destruction and killing six people in eastern Cuba.
On that occasion, Cubans sweated through an islandwide blackout that lasted four days.
Rafael is the 17th named storm of the season, which ends this month, and only the eighth major hurricane of Category 3 or stronger to form in the month of November over the past 60 years.
The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted the 2024 hurricane season was likely to be well above average with 17 to 25 named storms. The forecast called for as many as 13 hurricanes and four major hurricanes.
An average Atlantic hurricane season produces 14 named storms, seven of them hurricanes and three major hurricanes.Rafael is the 11th hurricane to form this year with five becoming major Category 3 storms with maximum sustained winds of 178km/h (111mph) or more.