Burning Atlanta

HAVANA (Reuters) - After a lull following Fidel Castro's illness last year, Cubans once again are taking to homemade boats or powerful speedboats manned by smugglers on a trip to the United States that often includes a detour through Mexico.

For those with a relative in Miami able to pay the $8,000 fare, there are illegal "cigarette" boats that jet in and out of the Cuban coast in broad daylight to pick up emigres.

These racing machines cost upward of $150,000 and are built for eight to 10 passengers but often speed away jam-packed with 30 to 40 people at their own peril.

With several 275-horsepower outboard motors, they are twice as fast as communist Cuba's Russian-built patrol boats and give the U.S. Coast Guard a run for their money, too.

So far this fiscal year, 2,819 Cubans have made it ashore in Florida, compared with 3,076 in all of last year, said U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman Zachary Mann.

The number of Cubans intercepted in the Florida Straits are still below -- but likely to exceed -- last year's 2,810, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.

To avoid interception by the U.S. Coast Guard and forced repatriation to Cuba, most boat people are now leaving through the Gulf of Mexico on speedboats that ferry them 140 miles to Mexico's Yucatan peninsula. Some also go south to the Cayman Islands, and on to Central America.

From there, they make their way north on well-trodden migrant routes to the U.S.-Mexico border. Once they are there, the Cubans are home and dry.

Unlike illegal migrants from other countries, Cubans can present themselves at land entry points and are automatically paroled into the United States as political refugees.

U.S. officials say 89 percent of the Cubans emigrating illegally from Cuba to the United States are entering by land border rather than coming ashore from a boat.