HAVANA, Cuba (AP) — A total blackout plunged all of Cuba into darkness Monday as the nation’s dwindling fuel supply and deteriorating power grid pushed the island to a breaking point.
Cuba’s state-run Electric Union announced the outage on X, noting that the cause is still being investigated. The country’s Ministry of Energy and Mines also posted on X, stating that emergency protocols to restore power have been set in motion.
The island’s fuel shortage has been mounting since January, when U.S. President Donald Trump threatened tariffs against any nation that sells or provides oil to Cuba. The threat deepened an already severe economic and financial crisis on the island, bringing public transportation to a near standstill and forcing officials to cancel tens of thousands of scheduled surgeries.
In Havana, the sudden darkness left residents anxious and scrambling. Lina May, 36, said she was left wondering when the lights would return so she could simply prepare a meal.
“I just told my dad that we have to buy charcoal because otherwise we won’t eat and we’ll starve,” she said.
Richard Valdés, 40, described the blackout as just the most recent in a long string of hardships.
“We’re without power again,” he said. “Now we have no water, no gas, nothing until they restore it.”
Cuba currently produces only 40% of the fuel it requires. A Russian tanker delivered 730,000 barrels of oil to the island in late March, but that supply was fully depleted by the end of April.
To cope with the shortage, the Cuban government has been implementing intentional power cuts that can last more than 24 consecutive hours at a time.
Previous major outages include a mid-May blackout that darkened the island’s eastern provinces and a mid-March event that knocked out power across the entire island.
Mario Pedroso, a 33-year-old Havana resident, reflected the weary acceptance shared by many Cubans when asked about Monday’s total blackout.
“Oil hasn’t come in here for a while, and we have no way to solve the problem,” he said. “We have to resist, as we Cubans say. That’s all.”
