Hurricane Elsa Update, Cubans Start Getting Ready
By Circles Robinson
HAVANA TIMES – Knowing the damage that hurricanes can wreak, many Cubans are getting prepared however they can for the possible arrival of Elsa on Sunday.
Plywood and the like for windows is only available for hotels and other government businesses. There is no legal way to purchase such protection.
Storing drinking water and having something at home to eat, already a major feat, are top priorities. Flashlight batteries and candles too when and if they are sold.
What was first a tropical storm on Thursday is now a hurricane reported the National Hurricane Center. The fast-moving system -30 mph on a west-northwest track-, is heading first for the southern Dominican Republic and Haiti on Saturday.
Unless it dissipates or weakens when touching land on Española Island, Elsa is expected to be of hurricane strength when it reaches land in Cuba sometime Sunday, after first passing close to Jamaica.
Besides protecting life, always a top priority for Cuban civil defense authorities, the island’s deteriorated housing and limited agriculture makes it especially vulnerable to such storms.
Meanwhile, in the last few days new records have been set with positive Covid-19 cases on the island. Many neighborhoods and whole communities are under quarantine in the different provinces as the government tries to regain control over the pandemic.
Additionally, four-and-five-hour blackouts are becoming commonplace in many provinces, especially hard during the hot, humid summer months.