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FROM
CUBA
Blackouts
damage Cubans' appliances
HAVANA, July 31 (www.cubanet.org) - Electric
service blackouts and, more frequently, fluctuations
in voltage, damage their hard-to-get and hard-to-repair
appliances, Cubans say.
Refrigerators become the biggest headache, because
they are the most necessary domestic appliance,
and since they are always plugged in, are most
often damaged by variations in the line voltage.
To top it all, they are the most expensive appliance
most people own, and they become the most difficult
to get repaired due to a shortage of parts and
supplies.
According to official figures quoted in the weekly
Ahora, 80 percent of refrigeration compressors
burn out due to mechanical faults. That 80 percent
translates to 100,000 units burnt out.
Even commercial establishments such as butcher
shops and fish mongers often have to put up with
refrigeration failures, imperiling their stock.
New refrigerators are expensive and usually only
available in dollars. Domestically assembled units
sell for about 550 dollars. Fifty- and sixty-year-old
U. S. made machines can often be found in private
homes.
The government sells some protective devices
in its chain of stores in an attempt to alleviate
the problem, but most here complain they are themselves
expensive, and they also break down.
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