10 days later, Cubans still recovering from Hurricane Ian

LA COLOMA, Cuba (AP) — Soldiers fix roofs and raise power poles under a blazing sun, while teachers salvage wet school books and residents cook over wood fires in La Coloma, a fishing and industrial town on Cuba’s coast that took the brunt of Hurricane Ian.

Ten days after the storm left still unquantified devastation across western Cuba, and knocked out the power grid nationwide, many Cubans are still without electricity, water or basic goods. The destruction from Ian has piled onto the hardship of people who had already been suffering through scarcity and shortages in recent years.

“The ceiling was damaged, the mattress got wet,” said homemaker Yaneysi Polier, who looked scared as she stirred a pot with pressed ham and lard cooking over coals on the floor of the patio of her house. Her still-wet mattress was in the sun drying.

“The refrigerator was found in the mud by our neighbor’s house. We set up something to sleep on. The water was up to our chests,” she said.