The breathtaking beauty of the beaches of the island municipality of Culebra, Puerto Rico, are touted on hundreds of tourism websites. Culebra is also home to the Culebra National Wildlife Refuge, created by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1909. What is often overlooked in the hype around visiting Culebra, is the fact that it is also home to a little over 1,000 residents, and the neighboring island municipality of Vieques is home to about 8000 people.

The residents of Culebra are surrounded by sea water, however for the last week or so, they have had no potable water to drink. This story barely made the news in Spanish, and as yet I have seen nothing in English language media, which isn’t surprising since coverage of Puerto Rico is generally shoddy, and when it happens is usually focused on the issue of statehood. 

Since I follow Puerto Rico news on a daily basis, I happened to see these tweets on July 14: “Culebra has been without drinking water service for four days, denounces its mayor.”

Then there was this: “Culebra residents have been without drinking water service for several days. Some have had to come to Isla Grande to get water by gallon since the cost has increased to $8 and up to $9 dollars.”

I couldn’t find an upload of the television news report. Concerned, I went to find more info, googled, found nothing in English, searched in Spanish for “agua” (water), “Culebra” and found this news item which had a little more detail:

Here’s the google translation:

Back in March, I wrote about ongoing protests around the life-threateningly unreliable ferry service to both islands, an issue which is still unresolved. Residents who are angry and frustrated have been reaching out on social media to the one “American” reporter who is known for covering Puerto Rico, ABC’s David Begnaud. 

As of yesterday, this is the reported situation, “Culebra still without water service.”

Rough Google translation:

Romero explained that although the Aqueduct and Sewer Authority (AAA) repaired the rupture last week, apparently, the water supply from Vieques was limited. He specified that, although Culebra needs 280 gallons of water per minute, only 80 gallons were being distributed to it.“This is less than the demand,” said the mayor.

The Culebra leader, Dolly Camarero, said that the upper parts of Culebra, Las Delicias, La Romana and the Clark community do not have water. Failures with the potable water system occur in the high tourism season of both Culebra and Vieques. Engineer Enrique Rosado Agosto, regional director of the AAA in the eastern region, told this media that the entire municipality of Culebra already had water, but when confronted with the sectors identified still without service, he said that “we are going to investigate.“However, he added that “the high consumption with the floating population” that is vacationing in Culebra represents a higher consumption than usual.“

Tourism is being encouraged by the Puerto Rican government, in spite of COVID-19, and Vieques and Culebra are prime destinations. What often gets overlooked are the people who call these two islands home. Home, without potable water, is hell. Even when the water situation is resolved, as pointed out by the tweeter Carlos, Vieques still has no hospital, and the ferry service still sucks.