For those living in Cuba’s once-iconic high-rises, the view from the top has always been a symbol of progress. But today, those same windows offer a grim panorama: a capital city plunged into darkness, its grid buckling under the weight of a collapsing economy. Blackouts have become the new normal, leaving residents in a state of perpetual uncertainty, their daily rhythms dictated by the whims of a failing infrastructure.
Havana’s skyline, punctuated by Soviet-era towers, is now a patchwork of light and shadow. For the people who call these buildings home, life has become a game of digital roulette. Will the power stay on long enough to cook dinner? Will the elevator work when they need to climb 20 floors? These are the questions that define their existence. “We never know when the lights will go out,” says Maria, a resident of the 35-storey Focsa building. “It could be for an hour, or it could be for the whole night. You can’t plan anything.”
This is not just an inconvenience; it is a systemic failure. Cuba’s energy grid, heavily reliant on imported oil and ageing Soviet-era power plants, has been crumbling for years. The economic crisis, exacerbated by US sanctions and the pandemic, has slashed fuel imports, forcing the government to impose rolling blackouts that can last up to 12 hours a day. For high-rise dwellers, the impact is multiplied. Water pumps stop working, leaving apartments dry. Refrigerators thaw, wasting precious food. And for those who are elderly or disabled, the stairs become an insurmountable barrier.
The psychological toll is immense. “You feel trapped,” says Carlos, a 45-year-old engineer who lives on the 18th floor of a building in Vedado. “You can’t leave because you don’t know when the power will return. And when it does, you have to rush to do everything: charge your phone, use the internet, cook, shower. It’s a frantic race against an invisible clock.”
The blackouts are also accelerating the economic collapse. Small businesses that rely on refrigeration or computing are grinding to a halt. The informal economy, which keeps many Cubans afloat, is being strangled. And tourism, once the lifeblood of Havana, is now a distant memory. “We used to have tourists in the rooftop bars,” recalls Maria. “Now the rooftop is just a dark place where we go to catch a breeze.”
This crisis is a stark reminder of the fragility of modern infrastructure. In the West, we take for granted the invisible systems that power our lives: the grid, the internet, the supply chains that deliver food and fuel. But in Cuba, these systems are failing. And as we push further into an era of artificial intelligence and quantum computing, we must ask ourselves: what happens when the foundation on which we build our future is made of sand? For Cubans, the answer is simple: you adapt, but the adaptation is a form of suffering.
The government’s response has been a mixture of improvisation and desperation. Solar panels are being installed, but too slowly. Blackout schedules are published, but they are rarely followed. And for those in high-rises, the message is clear: you are on your own. “We have learned to live without,” says Carlos. “But that is not a life. It is survival.”
This story is not just about Cuba. It is a cautionary tale for a world that is becoming increasingly interconnected and interdependent. Our digital lives, our smart cities, our very sense of normality are all dependent on a stable supply of electricity. And as climate change and geopolitical instability threaten that stability, we must ask: how vulnerable are we? The answer, as Havana’s high-rise residents know all too well, is more than we care to admit.
