Mirna Clavijo, 84, and her daughter Isabel Gutierrez, 61, cook dinner as Cuba’s national electric grid collapsed for the second time in a week, in Havana, Cuba, on March 21, 2026. (Norlys Perez/Reuters_
HAVANA—Cuba had restored power to nearly half of the capital Havana by Sunday afternoon, officials said, less than 24 hours after the national grid collapsed for the second time in a week amid a U.S. oil blockade that has dealt a major blow to the island’s already ailing energy infrastructure.
The grid failed Saturday evening at 6:32 p.m. after a major power plant in Nuevitas, in eastern Cuba’s Camaguey province, went offline, grid operator UNE said, causing a cascade effect that knocked out power to the nation’s approximately 10 million people.
