Heavy rains poured down this Tuesday over Holguín and other provinces in eastern Cuba, according to images and radar records shared on social media.
The provincial station Radio Angulo celebrated the arrival of water with a Facebook reel titled "Welcome the rain to #Holguín," which showcased an urban street under heavy rain, with flooded pavement and almost zero visibility. The post exceeded 9,200 views within a few hours.
The photographer Loidel Gainza also documented the downpour in the city with a series of images that traversed the wet streets of what he himself called "The City of Parks," showcasing the colonial architecture of Holguín under completely gray skies.
Radar images released by the page "El Tiempo en Freyre, Cuba y Más" revealed the extent of the rain system over the east: areas of highest intensity, marked in red, were focused in Bayamo and Santiago de Cuba, while Holguín, Banes, Moa, and Las Tunas recorded moderate to heavy activity.
The episode is not surprising in statistical terms. September is one of the rainiest months of the year in Holguín, with an average of 18 rainy days and around 304 mm of monthly precipitation, according to historical data for the region.
What is concerning is the accumulation of extreme events that the province has experienced in recent months. Last June, rainfall exceeding 80 mm flooded four communities in the municipality of Cacocum —La Rufina, Los Hidalgos, El Algarrobo, and El Canal—, with 265 homes affected in those settlements, according to the Cuban News Agency.
At the beginning of the year, Moa recorded 95 mm of rain in a few hours, which caused the Cabañas River to rise and a flood warning to be issued in the area.
The most significant precedent remains Hurricane Melissa, which in October 2025 left over 7,500 homes damaged in Holguín, with rescues in Cacocum and neighborhoods completely flooded for days.
A month before Melissa, Tropical Storm Imelda had already struck eastern Cuba, resulting in over 18,000 evacuations, leaving 17 communities isolated in Santiago de Cuba, and two fatalities, as reported at the time by Swissinfo. However, those rains also had a positive effect: they raised the reservoirs in Holguín by 2.1 million m³, temporarily improving water supply in the province.
The rain instability is not limited to the east. On September 8, a severe storm with hail and lightning caused disruptions in Molinet, Puerto Padre, in Las Tunas, and days later, torrential rains flooded the center of Matanzas, confirming a week of intense instability across the island.
The structural deterioration of homes, chronic urban drainage problems, and the precariousness of the infrastructure exacerbate the impact of each rainy episode in a region that, according to the Institute of Meteorology (INSMET), is facing this summer rainfall close to the historical norm but with maximum temperatures above average.
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