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Last Updated: Oct 28th, 2008 - 17:57:18 |
HAVANA (Reuters) - Hurricane Ike weakened on Monday as it raged through Cuba, where it blew off roofs, toppled trees and flattened sugar cane fields like a giant lawn mower on a path toward the U.S. oil hub in the Gulf of Mexico.
Oil prices rose $1.50 to above $107 a barrel on concerns that Ike would further disrupt energy output from the Gulf, which produces a quarter of U.S. oil and 15 percent of its natural gas. Much of that production was shut down by Hurricane Gustav's strike on the Louisiana coast last Monday.
Ike was expected to hit near eastern Texas, but a small deviation could threaten New Orleans, the city swamped in 2005 by Hurricane Katrina, which killed 1,500 people and caused $80 billion (45 billion pounds) in damage on the U.S. Gulf Coast. Gustav narrowly missed the low-lying city protected by floodwalls and levees.
The storm tore roofs off houses when it hit Britain's Turks and Caicos Islands as a ferocious Category 4 hurricane on the five-step Saffir-Simpson intensity scale, and floods triggered by its torrential rains were blamed for 61 deaths in Haiti, where 500 were killed by Tropical Storm Hanna last week.
ANGRY WAVES
Ike weakened to a Category 2 storm with 100 mph (160 kph) after roaring ashore in northeastern Cuba late on Sunday near Punta Lucrecia in the state of Holguin, about 510 miles (823 km) southeast of Havana.
Cuba's state-run television showed angry waves slamming into the sea wall and surging as high as nearby five-story apartment buildings before flooding the streets of the city of Baracoa near the eastern tip of the Communist-ruled island.
The storm was expected to traverse much of the 700-mile (1,125 km) island. It stripped ripening coffee from trees on the eastern part of the island, where 85 percent of Cuba's coffee is grown, paralyzed the nickel industry and destroyed sugar infrastructure.
"It seemed like the night would never end. Water. Wind. We are going to have to call on our African gods to recover from this," Eduardo Hernandez said by telephone from the city of Holguin. "There are trees and utility poles down everywhere."
Forecasters said Ike would hit Havana as it left the island on Tuesday. Authorities prepared to evacuate tens of thousands of residents from crumbling tenements, low-lying neighbourhoods and areas along the north coast.
"Attention Havana, attention Havana. Havana is on hurricane alert. All residents must strictly follow the instructions of the civil defence," local radio said repeatedly.
Officials said at least 1.1 million people were evacuated from vulnerable areas in Cuba, which is still reeling from Hurricane Gustav's strike on western provinces last week.
At 8 a.m. (1 p.m. British time), Ike was 20 miles (32 km) south of Camaguey, Cuba, heading west at 14 mph (23 kph), the U.S. National Hurricane Centre said. It was expected to reach the Gulf by Tuesday afternoon.
Rainfall of up to 20 inches (50 cm) in Cuba was possible, forecasters said.
Former Cuban leader Fidel Castro, who has taken to writing columns since handing over power to his brother Raul, wrote on Sunday that the flow of international aid to Cuba since Gustav showed that it had many friends who wanted to help.
He said, without giving details, that close ally Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez had taken "measures that make up the most generous gesture of solidarity that our country has known."
FLORIDA KEYS EVACUATION
Just to the north of Cuba, schools, hospitals and government offices were closed in the Florida Keys, a 110-mile (177-km) island chain connected by a single road.
The fragile islands were not expected to take a direct hit, but tourists were evacuated and residents were told to leave as a precaution.
Ike ripped off roofs and knocked down trees and power lines as it passed over Great Inagua, the Bahamas' southernmost island and the Turks and Caicos. No deaths were reported.
The storm dumped more rain on Haiti, which has been swamped by four storms in the last few weeks. Officials said 57 of the 61 victims died in Cabaret, a town north of the capital.
Forecasters expected Ike to be a Category 3 hurricane, with sustained winds above 110 mph (177 kph) when it approaches the U.S. coast on Saturday. Its likeliest destination was east Texas, but at least one computer model takes it ashore just west of New Orleans, near where Gustav hit last week.
Oil companies that began returning workers to offshore platforms that were evacuated before Gustav hit made preparations for another possible strike by the weekend.
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