Millions without power as another nationwide blackout hits Cuba | Politics News

According to authorities, the Antonio Guiteras power plant was shut down overnight, causing the national grid to collapse.

Cuba’s national power grid has collapsed again, leaving millions of people on the Caribbean island without power in the latest outage of its kind in recent months.

Authorities said the Antonio Guiteras power plant in Matanzas, the country’s largest power producer, was shut down around 2 a.m. (0700 GMT) on Wednesday, causing the grid to collapse.

The Ministry of Energy and Mines said in a post on social media that it was working to restore power.

Cuba’s oil power plants, outdated and difficult to operate, fell into complete crisis this year as oil imports from Venezuela, Russia and Mexico fell.

The system failure on Wednesday morning left the capital Havana almost completely in the dark, the Reuters news agency reported, citing a witness.

Predawn lights could only be seen in a handful of large hotels and government buildings on the city skyline.

Reports of power outages elsewhere in Cuba on social media suggested the entire island of 10 million people was without power, although the government has not yet confirmed the extent of the blackout.

Later Wednesday morning, the gradual restoration of power began in some parts of the country, including Havana.

Cuban Energy and Mines Minister Vicente de la O Levy later said in a televised address that service would be fully restored by Thursday.

Cuba’s power grid collapsed several times in October as fuel supplies ran out and Hurricane Oscar struck the far eastern end of the island, prompting authorities to close schools and non-essential workplaces.

In November, Hurricane Raphael crippled the grid again when it hit the island as a Category 3 storm.

The storm hit Cuba with winds of 185 km/h (115 mph), damaging homes, uprooting trees and toppling telephone poles.

Cuban authorities have blamed previous outages on difficulties obtaining fuel for power plants, which they blamed on the tightening of a six-decade-long U.S. trade embargo during Donald Trump’s first presidency.

But the country has also experienced a broader economic crisis marked by rising inflation and shortages of medicine, food and water.