Cuba left in total darkness as Hurricane Rafael knocks out power grid

Cuba was battered by a fierce Category 3 hurricane connected Thursday which knocked retired the country’s powerfulness grid.

The magnitude of the interaction remained unclear done the aboriginal hours of the day, but forecasters warned that Hurricane Rafael could bring "life-threatening" tempest surges, winds and flash floods.

State-run TV reported the full colonisation of 10 cardinal radical was without power.

On Wednesday evening, monolithic waves lashed astatine Havana's shores arsenic crisp winds and rainfall near trees littered connected flooded roads. Much of the metropolis was acheronian and deserted.

As it ploughed crossed Cuba, the tempest slowed to a Category 2 hurricane chugging into the Gulf of Mexico adjacent bluish Mexico and confederate Texas, according to the US National Hurricane Centre successful Miami.

Many Cubans were already picking up the pieces of blackouts past period which stretched connected for days, arsenic portion of the island’s vigor crisis, and different almighty hurricane that killed astatine slightest six radical successful eastbound Cuba.

It has stoked discontent already simmering successful Cuba amid an ongoing economical crisis.

The US State Department issued a question informing for Cuba implicit the tempest portion the Cuban authorities besides asked citizens to hunker down.

Classes and nationalist transport were suspended connected parts of the land and authorities cancelled flights successful and retired of Havana and Varadero.

Thousands of radical successful the westbound of the land were evacuated arsenic a preventative measure.

The interest came aft the tempest knocked retired powerfulness successful the Cayman Islands and Jamaica, wherever it besides unleashed flooding and landslides.

The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted the 2024 hurricane play was apt to beryllium good supra average, with betwixt 17 and 25 named storms. 

The forecast predicted arsenic galore arsenic 13 hurricanes and 4 large hurricanes.

An mean Atlantic hurricane play produces 14 named storms, 7 of them hurricanes and 3 large hurricanes.