Havana: A partial collapse puts more than 300 residents on alert

Havana/Part of the roof of the fourth floor of a building located at Águila 368, corner of San Miguel, in Centro Habana, collapsed this Wednesday around 6:10 in the morning. The collapse left no victims, but neighbors fear that it is the announcement of a greater collapse in a building where more than 300 people live.

“Luckily there were no human losses or injuries,” he told 14ymedio Juan Goberna, director of the Cuban Network for People with Disabilities, who lives with his wife on the second floor. The activist warns, however, that the deterioration of the building and the lack of repairs keep residents under the threat of a total collapse.

On the top floor of the building, a large section of the ceiling collapsed and now allows direct views of the sky from inside. Below, pieces of concrete, dust and other debris cover the floor and accumulate near the metal railing of the staircase. Along with the bare and rusty bars of the structure, moisture stains spread in the areas of the ceiling that still remain standing.

“A neighbor began to scream and people jumped out of bed to see what was happening, but it was only when it began to dawn that the seriousness of what happened could be seen.”

“I was already awake when I heard the roar and the entire building shook,” says Goberna. “A neighbor began to scream and people jumped out of bed to see what was happening, but it was only when it began to dawn that the seriousness of what happened could be seen. To make matters worse today it has been raining since early morning so the water has entered through the hole.”

The activist explains that “there are neighbors who are on the street right now and do not want to enter the building for fear that fragments will continue to fall.” Those in a worse situation, he continues, “are those on the fourth floor, but the collapse also damaged part of the roof of the third floor due to the weight of the debris that fell.”

Goberna clarifies that “this is the first partial collapse that the building has suffered, but landslides had already occurred on the roof of the top floor, although until now they were superficial pieces.” An initiative to prop up the structure with wood failed due to a lack of fuel, which complicated the hiring of a truck on which to transport the beams.

Signs of prolonged deterioration are also evident from the street. The facade, of lines art decohas windows without carpentry, open holes and areas blackened by humidity. Built in 1936 and originally intended as a hotel, the property ended up becoming a huge collective home, with numerous families divided between rooms and subdivided spaces.

The building is located in the Colón Popular Council, one of the most densely populated areas of Central Havana. There, the old mansions, hotels and guest houses transformed into quarters house several generations of the same family or numerous groups under a single roof. Overcrowding and construction deterioration are part of the daily landscape of a municipality where it is enough to walk a few blocks to find shorings, closed balconies and facades about to fall off.

Wednesday’s partial collapse occurs just days after a deadly collapse in the capital. On September 22, two people died when the portal of his home collapsed in Lawton, in the Diez de Octubre municipality. Neighbors then told 14ymedio that the inhabitants of the house had repeatedly warned of the danger posed by the property, without obtaining a solution from the authorities.

Partial collapses also tend to become a long sentence for those who remain inside. Many families continue to live in buildings declared uninhabitable or in danger of collapsing because they have nowhere to move and state shelters do not represent an immediate solution either. Each rainy season increases the risk in a city with a very aging housing stock and decades of insufficient maintenance.