HAVANA, Sept 8: Hurricane Ike raged through Cuba on Monday, blowing off roofs, toppling trees and flattening sugar cane fields like a giant lawn mower on a path toward US oil fields in the Gulf of Mexico.
After killing dozens of people in its run through the Caribbean, Ike lost some of its power over Cuba but was still causing widespread damage and was expected to strengthen again when it heads into the Gulf later this week.
Ike’s approach further disrupted energy output from the Gulf, which produces a quarter of US oil and 15 per cent of its natural gas. Much of that production was first shut down before Hurricane Gustav pounded the region last week.
Ike was expected to hit eastern Texas, but a small deviation could threaten New Orleans, the city swamped in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina killed 1,500 people and caused $80 billion in damage on the US Gulf Coast. Gustav narrowly missed the low-lying city protected by floodwalls and levees.
Ike 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 at least 61 deaths in Haiti, where Tropical Storm Hanna killed 500 last week.
Ike weakened to a Category 2 storm with 160 kph after roaring ashore in northeastern Cuba late on Sunday near Punta Lucrecia, about 820 km southeast of Havana.
Cuba’s state-run television showed huge 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.
“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 in the city of Holguin.
The storm was expected to traverse much of the 1,125 km island. It stripped ripening coffee from trees in the east, where 85 per cent of Cuba’s coffee is grown, paralysed the nickel industry and destroyed sugar infrastructure.
Sugar prices rose as Ike moved across the key Caribbean growing region.
Forecasters said Ike would pass near or over Havana as it leaves 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 11am (1500 GMT), Ike was 72 km west-southwest of Camaguey, Cuba, heading west at 23 kph, the US National Hurricane Center said, adding that Cuba could see up to 20 inches of rain.
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.
Just to the north of Cuba, schools, hospitals and government offices were closed in the Florida Keys, a 177-km island chain connected by a single road. The islands were not expected to take a direct hit, but tourists were evacuated. Residents had also been ordered out but that measure was allowed to expire as Ike took a more southerly route.
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’s core to move over warm water south of Cuba on Monday, which would help the storm maintain strength, and it was expected to be a Category 1 hurricane when it emerges from Cuba’s north coast on Tuesday.
It is then expected to strengthen to a Category 3 with sustained winds above 177 kph when it approaches the US coast on Saturday. Its likeliest destination was east Texas, but several computer models take it ashore in Louisiana west of New Orleans, not far from where Gustav hit last week.
Energy companies delayed the restart of offshore oil and natural gas production because of Ike, which was likely to pare inventories in coming weeks. Shell Oil Co said it planned to evacuate all Gulf offshore personnel by Wednesday.—Reuters