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Hurricane Ike weakens to Category 2 over Cuba
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-09-08 21:10

After traversing Cuba, Ike could regain Category 3 strength over the warm Gulf of Mexico waters and threaten the 4,000 platforms that produce 25 percent of US oil and 15 percent of its natural gas, and point toward Louisiana and Texas.

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Oil jumped $1.50 to above $107 a barrel on Monday on worries that Ike would tear through the Gulf and while traders awaited OPEC's decision this week on output policy.

Ike may threaten New Orleans, the city swamped in 2005 by Hurricane Katrina, which killed 1,500 people and caused $80 billion in damage on the US Gulf Coast. Gustav narrowly missed New Orleans last Monday.

Over central Cuba

At 5 a.m. EDT, Ike was 40 miles southeast of Camaguey, Cuba, heading west near 15 mph (24 kph). The storm's center was expected to spin over central Cuba during Monday and reach the Gulf by late Tuesday, the hurricane center said.

Rainfall of up to 20 inches in Cuba was possible, forecasters said.

As Ike roared through the Caribbean, residents of the Florida Keys, a 110-mile (177-km) island chain connected by bridges with only one road out, were told to evacuate as a precaution.

Ike ripped off roofs and knocked over trees and power lines as it passed over Great Inagua, the Bahamas' southernmost island and Britain's Turks and Caicos islands. No deaths were reported.

It hit Turks and Caicos as a Category 4 storm with 135 mph (215 kph) winds, damaging 80 percent of the houses on Grand Turk, home to about 2,500 of the islands' 22,000 residents, government spokesman Courtney Robinson said.