Cuba’s Jet Fuel Supply Runs Dry as U.S. Sanctions Choke Oil Lifeline
Havana, Cuba — Airlines serving the Caribbean island nation found themselves in uncharted territory on Feb. 10 as Cuban aviation authorities officially cut off jet fuel supplies at all nine of the country’s international airports, including José Martí International in the capital. The suspension, expected to last through at least March 11, is a direct consequence of Washington’s escalating pressure campaign against Cuba’s oil supply chain — one that has now severed the island from its two principal petroleum sources.
The NOTAMs issued late on Sunday confirmed what carriers had feared for weeks. With Venezuela’s crude shipments halted following the U.S. military operation that deposed President Nicolás Maduro in January, and Mexico now stepping back from its own supply commitments under the threat of American tariffs, Cuba is effectively out of options. According to data analytics firm Kpler, the island’s oil reserves had dwindled to a 15- to 20-day supply by late January. That buffer has now expired.
The fallout for airlines has been swift. Air Canada moved first, announcing the suspension of all passenger services to the island — roughly 16 weekly frequencies from Toronto and Montreal combined. The carrier is now running empty repositioning flights to bring home an estimated 3,000 Canadian tourists stranded across Cuban resorts. It’s a significant operational undertaking, and one that underscores just how deeply Canadian carriers are exposed to Cuba’s tourism market. Canadians have long represented the single largest source of visitors to the island, though those numbers have been sliding sharply — down nearly 26 percent in the first half of 2025 alone.
European operators are adapting rather than withdrawing. Spain’s Iberia and Air Europa have both opted to keep their Cuban routes alive by inserting technical fuel stops in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, adding time and cost to each rotation. Air France confirmed a similar arrangement, with refueling stops elsewhere in the Caribbean. For long-haul operators, the math is straightforward but painful: tankering enough fuel for a round trip from Europe isn’t feasible, so intermediate stops become the only workable solution. Regional carriers with shorter stage lengths may manage by uploading extra fuel at their home bases, but even that strategy has limits.
No scheduled passenger flights currently operate between Belgium or the Netherlands and Cuba, though charter operators serving those markets could face disruption if conditions persist.
The timing couldn’t be worse for an island that has watched its tourism sector hollow out over the past five years. Before the pandemic, Cuba welcomed upwards of 4.2 million international visitors annually, a figure that had been climbing steadily through the détente years of the Obama administration. That number collapsed during COVID-19 and has never recovered. By 2024, arrivals had slipped to roughly 2.2 million — well short of the government’s 3.2 million target. The first half of 2025 brought even grimmer data, with just under one million tourists recorded through June, a 25 percent drop year over year. The government’s revised target of 2.6 million for the full year already looked aspirational before the fuel crisis; it now appears all but unreachable.
The broader energy emergency extends well beyond aviation. Cuban citizens are enduring rolling blackouts of up to ten hours daily, hospitals have reportedly canceled surgeries due to power and supply shortages, and the government has imposed emergency austerity measures including shortened work weeks, fuel rationing, and reduced public transport. Major cultural events, including the Havana International Book Fair, have been suspended. Some banks have cut their operating hours, and fuel stations have shifted to dollar-only sales capped at 20 liters per customer.
For the aviation industry, the precedent isn’t entirely new — fuel availability in Cuba has been spotty before, and carriers have previously routed through Nassau, Bahamas for technical stops. But one veteran pilot told reporters that an official suspension of this duration and scope is extraordinary, even by Cuban standards. And should the crisis extend beyond the stated March 11 deadline, the consequences could deepen considerably. Ground operations at Cuban airports depend on the same constrained fuel supply, meaning that even airlines willing to tanker their own jet fuel may eventually find airports unable to support basic ground handling, power generation, or emergency services.
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel has signaled a willingness to negotiate with Washington, though insisting on terms free of preconditions. The Trump administration, for its part, has framed its pressure campaign as leverage toward making Cuba “a freer nation.” Whether that diplomatic standoff resolves before the fuel runs out entirely remains an open question — and one the island’s battered tourism economy can ill afford to leave unanswered for long.
Photo Credit: Alexander Kunze
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