PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Tropical Storm Isaac dumped torrential rains on Haiti and flattened tent camps housing survivors of a devastating earthquake, then began an assault on eastern Cuba yesterday.
Isaac killed at least four people in Haiti and was expected to strengthen into a hurricane before hitting the Florida Keys on Sunday and crossing into the Gulf of Mexico.
Fuelled by warm Gulf waters, it was forecast to strengthen into a Category 2 hurricane with 100-mph (160-kph) winds and hit the US coast somewhere between the Florida Panhandle and New Orleans at midweek.
Isaac’s march toward the Gulf comes as U.S. Republicans prepare to gather in Tampa, on Florida’s central Gulf Coast, for Monday’s start of their national convention ahead of the November presidential election.
Energy operators in the Gulf of Mexico were shutting down offshore oil and gas rigs ahead of Isaac.
The storm could spur short-term shut-downs of 43 percent of U.S. offshore oil capacity and 38 percent of its natural gas output, according to forecasters at Weather Insight, an arm of Thomson Reuters. Isaac’s rain and winds lashed Haiti’s southern coast yesterday, flooding parts of the capital Port-au-Prince and ripping through flimsy resettlement camps that house more than 350,000 survivors of the 2010 earthquake.
A 10-year-old girl was killed near Port-au-Prince when a wall fell on her and a woman in the southern coastal city of Jacmel was crushed to death when a tree fell on her house, government officials said.
At a tent camp in the seaside slum of Cite Soleil, corrugated plastic shacks were broken apart and water gushed in.
“We had never seen anything like this. Everyone fled to the church, but I didn’t want to leave my home. All my things are wet,” said Edeline Trevil, 47, who survived with her cat.
“I’m cold! I’ve been wet since last night,” the shoeless woman added. The storm caused power outages and flooding and blew off roofs as it moved across the hilly and severely deforested Caribbean country. Winds had died down by yesterday afternoon but forecasters said rains would continue in Haiti.
Damage had so far been less than feared, said George Ngwa, Haiti spokesman for the United Nations Office of Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. “Fortunately there are no reports of serious damage,” he said.
By late Saturday afternoon, Isaac’s centre was over eastern Cuba, 120 miles (195 km) east of Camaguey, Cuba, the US National Hurricane Center said.
The storm had top winds of 60 mph (95 kph) and would become a hurricane if those swirling winds reach 74 mph (119 kph). A hurricane warning was in effect for the Florida Keys and the southwest coast of Florida.
