CAMAGUEY, Cuba (AP):Deadly Hurricane Ike roared across Cuba yesterday, blowing homes to rubble and sending waves crashing over apartment buildings. Some 900,000 Cubans evacuated, and forecasters said it could hit Louisiana or Texas this weekend.
Ike, which raked the Bahamas and worsened floods in Haiti that have killed 321 people, made landfall on Cuba as a fearsome Category-3 hurricane, then weakened to a still-potent Category-2 yesterday as it ran along the length of the island.
There were no immediate reports of deaths in Cuba, despite storm-whipped waves that crashed into five-storey apartment buildings, hurling heavy spray over their rooftops, and winds that uprooted trees and toppled utility poles.
Terrifying force
"I have never seen anything like it in my life. So much force is terrifying," said Olga Alvarez, 70, huddling in her living room in Camaguey with her husband and teenage grandson. "We barely slept last night. It was just "boom, boom, boom."'
By early afternoon, Ike had moved just offshore, giving it fuel to maintain its strength over Cuba, said Felix Garcia, a meteorologist at the National Hurricane Center.
"It's over warm waters," Garcia said. "It can definitely maintain its strength right now, and when it's out of Cuba it has the potential to become a lot stronger."
Ike was forecast to hit Havana, where decaying, historic buildings are especially vulnerable, before moving into the Gulf of Mexico and slamming into the United States.
As the hurricane's eye passed just south of Camaguey, falling utility poles, crushed cars parked along narrow streets and the roaring wind blew apart some older buildings of stone and brick, leaving behind only piles of rubble. A tree smashed the box office of an old-fashioned movie theatre and toppled street signs shattered the picture windows of department stores.
Widespread rainfall
Cuban state television reported widespread rainfall of more than 4 inches (100 mm), with more than 8 inches (210 mm) in some places.
Families huddled inside their homes, watching from behind the iron gates of doorways as diagonal sheets of stinging rain fed rising flood waters. A huge piece of plastic roofing spun like a top in the wind above a traffic intersection.
"This critter was angry, really angry," said Delia Oliveras, 64. Winds tore the roof off the living room where her family was huddled, and they rode out the storm in a covered patio. "We have seen hurricanes, but never as big as this."
