Collapse: Two elderly people die when a doorway collapses in Lawton

Havana/Two people died this Sunday in the partial collapse of a house located on the corner of 8th and San Francisco, in Lawton, Havana municipality of Diez de Octubre, as reported on Facebook by Geovanys García. The victims, two elderly men whose identity had not been revealed at the time of writing this note, were sitting in the doorway when part of the structure fell on their heads.

Firefighters and health personnel participated in the rescue efforts, complicated by “the mass of concrete and metal that came down” and for the risk that other parts of the property would be transferred. According to García, the house was left uninhabitable, with visible cracks and a single column supporting what remains of the portal. A front column also ended up leaning on an adjacent house of more recent construction, which apparently suffered no visible damage.

The building had a structure of beams and slabs and a high strut, exceeding five meters, a circumstance that would have aggravated the impact of the collapse on the victims. The recent rains and the construction deterioration of the property are pointed out in the publication as factors that could have influenced the tragedy, although so far there is no technical opinion on the causes.

Neighbors, dismayed by the two deaths, also expressed concern for another resident who remained inside the house after the collapse, presumably the son of the deceased.

The accident once again puts the focus on a problem that has accompanied Havana residents for years and that worsens during the rainy season. Propped roofs, cracked balconies, beams cracked by humidity and facades that threaten to fall are part of the daily landscape of numerous neighborhoods in the capital, not just the municipalities with the most old houses.

Diez de Octubre has recorded several serious episodes. In March 2025, two people, a woman and a 15-year-old teenager, were injured when a family building collapsed at number 552 Calzada de Diez de Octubre, near Santa Irene. Four months later, another building in the municipality that was “in the process of demolition” collapsed with three people inside and one of them died. That same day, the collapse of a building on Monte Street, in Old Havana, caused three more deaths, including that of a seven-year-old girl.

Last September, another elderly man died after the partial collapse of a building on Sol Street, between Egido and Villegas, in Old Havana. The authorities then recognized that the property had not been in constructive condition for years. A neighbor then told 14ymedio that the three metal beams that supported the roof were rotted by humidity and that the wooden struts could not prevent the structure from giving way.

Official data released in 2025 placed the accumulated housing needs in Cuba at 805,583

A month earlier, the partial collapse of the former headquarters of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce, on Reina Street in Central Havana, had left an elderly woman injured and about 15 families, nearly 50 people, unable to return to their homes. In February of that same year, ten families lost their homes after a three-story building collapsed in San Bernardino, between Durege and General Serrano, in Santos Suárez, another neighborhood in Diez de Octubre. The property had been declared uninhabitable years before.

The magnitude of the deterioration goes beyond individual cases. Official data released in 2025 put the accumulated housing needs in Cuba at 805,583: 398,364 homes required rehabilitation and another 407,219 had to be rebuilt.

Rains usually accelerate the outcome of structures weakened for decades due to humidity, lack of maintenance and difficulty in obtaining materials. In June 2024, after several days of storms, at least 19 buildings suffered partial or total collapses in Havana, according to a source consulted at the time by 14ymedio.

This Sunday, however, those statistics once again took on a tragic dimension in Lawton.