Small protests appear in Havana over islandwide blackout

HAVANA — A few hundred Cubans took to the streets Thursday night in Havana demanding the restoration of electricity, protesting more than two days after a blackout hit the entire island following the passage of Hurricane Ian.

An Associated Press journalist saw a total of about 400 people gathered in at least two spots in the Cerro neighborhood shouting, “We want light, we want light,” and banging pots and pans.

It was the first public outpouring of anger after electricity problems spread from western Cuba, where Ian hit, and knocked out all of the island’s power grid Tuesday night, leaving its 11 million people in the dark.

The storm also left three people dead and caused still unquantified damage.

In addition to power problems Thursday in Havana, internet service was out and cellphones did not work.

Groups that monitor internet access confirmed to the AP the internet disruption in the island.

“We can confirm the near-total internet blackout in Cuba,” said Alp Toker, director of Netblocks, a London-based internet monitoring firm. He said that what his group sees is different than what happened right after the hurricane hit the island.

“We believe the incident is likely to significantly impact the free flow of information amid protests,” he said.

Doug Madory, director of internet analysis at Kentik Inc., a network intelligence company, describes it as a “total internet blackout” that started at 00:30 GMT.

At a protest on Primellef Street, police arrived but demonstrators remained on one of the corners.

About 10 blocks away, on the Calzada del Cerro, other protesters surrounded a work team trying to repair a pole and a light transformer.

The two groups of protesters were still in the streets late into the night, but the gatherings remained peaceful.