dpa
Havana
At least one person has died in the partial collapse of a residential building in Havana’s famous old town, while two other people remain trapped under the rubble, the Cuban government said on Wednesday.
It was not initially known why the obviously dilapidated house had partially collapsed during the night, but it had been raining heavily. Officials say 13 families with a total of 54 people lived in the three-storey building.
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said the person killed in the collapse was a rescue worker.
Rescue teams were trying to access the building where two people remained trapped after Tuesday night’s collapse. While the reason for the collapse was not immediately known, the area has several aging buildings that lack maintenance and deteriorate in tropical rains, like those currently hitting the island.
Alexis Acosta Silva, mayor of Old Havana, told local media there were 54 people in the three-story building at the time of the collapse. Families were evacuated to a nearby school, and no damage was reported to surrounding buildings.
Poor maintenance of existing residential buildings and the slow rate of building new ones have been top complaints among Cuba’s citizens. Many houses and other parts of the infrastructure in Cuba are in poor condition because they have not been maintained for decades, or only in a makeshift manner.
Most recently, a man died last Thursday when the ceiling of an apartment collapsed in central Havana, the capital of the socialist Caribbean country.
The United States trade embargo that has been in place for more than 60 years, further US sanctions as well as the poorly performing economy make it difficult for Cubans to procure building materials.
Cuba’s Director of Housing Vivian Rodríguez said this week that the island has a housing deficit of 800 homes, especially in the provinces of Havana, Holguín, Santiago de Cuba and Camagüey.
Government figures from 2020 showed Cuba had 3.9 million homes. Of these, nearly 40 percent were in fair and poor condition.
