By Jeff Franks
HAVANA (Reuters) - Hurricane Ike pounded northeastern Cubawith 120 mile per hour (195 kph) winds, torrential rains andmassive waves that rolled through coastal towns on Sunday on apath toward the Gulf of Mexico oil fields and possibly NewOrleans.
State-run television showed angry waves slamming into thesea wall and surging as high as nearby five-story apartmentbuildings before flooding the streets of the city of Baracoanear the eastern tip of the communist-ruled island.
Ike, a dangerous Category 3 storm, had earlier rippedthrough the southern Bahamas and added to the misery and deathtoll in storm-battered Haiti. Officials said at least 61 peoplehad died in floods in impoverished Haiti on top of 500 killedlast week by Tropical Storm Hanna.
The Cuban Meteorology Institute said the storm crashed intothe coast near Punta Lucrecia in the state of Holguin, about510 miles (823 km) southeast of Havana.
"There is lot of worry, windows are beginning to break," awoman named Carmela said by telephone from the hotel where sheworks in the city of Holguin, 30 miles (50 km) from PuntaLucrecia. "There's a lot of water, it's raining very heavily."
Officials said at least 1.1 million people were evacuatedahead of a storm expected to slash through the heart of Cuba,which is still reeling from Hurricane Gustav's hard hit on thewest side of the long, narrow island last week.
After traversing Cuba, Ike is projected to enter the Gulfof Mexico, where 4,000 platforms produce 25 percent of U.S. oiland 15 percent of its natural gas, and point toward Louisianaand Texas.
Ike may threaten New Orleans, the city swamped in 2005 byHurricane Katrina, which killed 1,500 people and caused $80billion in damage on the U.S. Gulf Coast. Gustav narrowlymissed New Orleans last Monday.
STORM TO WEAKEN
The storm was expected to weaken as it moved across Cuba,but regain strength when it reemerges in the warm Gulf waters.Rainfall up to 20 inches (50.80 cm) was possible in Cuba,forecasters said.
As Ike roared through the Caribbean, residents of theFlorida Keys, a 110-mile (177-km) island chain connected bybridges with only one road out, were told to evacuate as aprecaution.
Ike ripped off roofs and knocked over trees and power linesas it passed over Great Inagua, the Bahamas' southernmostisland and Britain's Turks and Caicos islands. No deaths werereported.
It hit Turks and Caicos as a Category 4 storm with 135 mph(215 kph) winds, damaging 80 percent of the houses on GrandTurk, home to about 2,500 of the islands' 22,000 residents,government spokesman Courtney Robinson said.
Ike dumped more heavy rain on Haiti, where officials said57 of the 61 victims on Sunday died in Cabaret, a town north ofthe capital, Port-au-Prince.
"The whole village is flooded," civil protection officialMoise Jean-Pierre said. "The death toll could go higher."
Flooding from Tropical Storm Hanna last week was believedto have killed at least 500 people around the port city ofGonaives.
On Sunday, rain from Ike was causing the La Quinte river torise again and floodwaters were seeping back into Gonaives,Mayor Stephen Moise said. All of the bridges linking the cityto the rest of the country had collapsed.
"Gonaives is really a devastated and isolated city," hesaid. "We cannot bear another hurricane."
In the neighbouring Dominican Republic, a 60-year-old manwas killed by a falling palm tree and some 41,000 people weredriven from their homes by rain and gusty winds.
Cuban authorities used buses, trucks and othertransportation to move thousands of tourists from prime resortsalong the northern coast. Ranchers herded cattle in grazingareas of eastern Las Tunas and Camaguey to higher ground.
In Havana, police with loudspeakers passed through thestreets urging people to take steps to protect their property.
Holguin, where Ike came ashore, is home to Cuba's nickelindustry, the country's most important export. Holguin's minesand three processing plants in the mountains were shut down.
Former Cuban leader Fidel Castro, who has taken to writingcolumns since handing over power to his brother Raul, wrote onSunday that the flow of international aid to Cuba since Gustavshowed that it had many friends who wanted to help.
He said, without giving details, that close ally VenezuelanPresident Hugo Chavez had taken "measures that make up the mostgenerous gesture of solidarity that our country has known."
Despite the hard blows from hurricanes, Castro said hebelieved Cubans would receive the aid they needed to recover.
Forecasters expected Ike to weaken to a Category 1 storm onthe five-step Saffir-Simpson intensity scale over Cuba but toregain Category 3 strength as it nears the U.S. Gulf coast.
Oil companies had begun returning workers to the offshoreplatforms that were evacuated before Gustav hit but beganpreparing for the arrival of Ike.
(Additional reporting by Joseph Guyler Delva inPort-au-Prince, Esteban Israel in Havana, Michael Haskins inKey West, John Marquis in Nassau, Tom Brown and Jim Loney inMiami and Manuel Jimenez in the Dominican Republic; Editing byMichael Christie and)
