Deadly Storm Hits Cuba, Nears Florida

SANTO DOMINGO — Tropical Storm Noel slogged across Cuba today and drew closer to Florida after causing flooding and mudslides that killed at least 19 people elsewhere in the Caribbean.Forecasters projected the storm would emerge over water tomorrow near Cuba’s Cayo Coco resort area, turn northeast toward the Bahamas and strengthen. The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami warned people in southeast Florida to monitor the storm.Noel had been forecast to hit Haiti hardest but veered toward the Dominican Republic, apparently catching residents off guard yesterday.Two women died in Haiti today when they were washed away by flood waters near the city of Gantier, the director of Haiti’s civil protection agency, Marie Alta Jean-Baptiste, said. One child also was found dead in the seaside slum of Cite Soleil, a Brazilian commander of the U.N. force in Haiti, Major General Carlos Alberto Dos Santos Cruz, said.Officials in the neighboring Dominican Republic, meanwhile, revised the death toll downward to 16. The National Emergency Commission reported yesterday that at least 20 had died in the storm, but yesterday, a agency spokesman, Luis Luna Paulino, said they had miscalculated in issuing the earlier figure.Rain was still pounding the two countries today.“We didn’t know that it was going to be like this, it took us by surprise,” Guarionex Rosado said as he left his home in La Cienaga, one of Santo Domingo’s most affected neighborhoods.Almost 12,000 people were driven from their homes in the Dominican Republic, and nearly 3,000 homes were destroyed, while collapsed bridges and swollen rivers have isolated 36 towns, Mr. Luna Paulino said.The dead included three people swept up by a fast-moving river in San Jose de Ocoa and three others buried in a mudslide in the port city of Haina, officials said.In Haiti, about 2,000 people were evacuated from homes from the southern coastal city of Jacmel, where at least 150 residents were stranded on rooftops. Officials said bad weather prevented helicopters from reaching them by air.Hundreds also were evacuated in the capital, Port-au-Prince, where muddy water was so deep in some streets that people swam in it.There were no immediate reports of deaths or major damage in Cuba, but authorities canceled classes for more than 13,000 students and prepared shelters for possible evacuations.At 2 p.m., Noel was centered about 30 miles east-southeast of Camaguey, Cuba, and it was moving west at about 8 mph. Maximum sustained winds were 40 mph, down from 60 mph earlier.

Deadly Storm Hits Cuba, Nears Florida

Deadly Storm Hits Cuba, Nears Florida

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