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Hurricane Dennis

In Cuba, storm leaves behind destruction

HAVANA - Hundreds of homes along Cuba's southeastern coast were destroyed or heavily damaged as the toll from Hurricane Dennis continued to rise Saturday.

The storm also caused heavy damage to banana, mango and avocado crops in the island's central section, according to state radio.

Dennis killed at least 10 people in Cuba, including a child who fell into roiling waters as a mother tried to cross an old bridge. Two middle-aged sisters were crushed to death when a wall collapsed in their home in the southeast coastal province of Granma.

As the storm passed east of Havana, waves as high as 10 feet crashed over the city's Malecon sea wall. Fierce gusts of wind tore huge chunks of concrete off dilapidated colonial buildings and shattered glass globes from antique street lamps in the city's old section. Downed trees and utility poles littered roads.

By Saturday morning, however, the winds had quieted, the ocean was flat and all hurricane watches and warnings for Cuba had been lifted. Wary residents began leaving their homes to check for damage outside.

"There was so much wind I didn't sleep all night," said Justo Jesus Castro, a 36-year-old soccer coach in the coastal town of Guanabo. "It was out of this world."

Most of the damage in and around Havana and nearby beach towns appeared limited to uprooted trees and ripped lampposts and highway signs.

The electricity had been shut off Friday before the storm reached the city of 2-million to prevent injury from fallen power lines. It remained off Saturday.

Huge waves swept away coastal homes as the storm's center made landfall on central Cuba's southern coast in the early afternoon Friday. Civil defense officials said more than 1.5-million people left their homes to take shelter with family or friends, or in government refuges.

Cuban television showed Defense Minister Raul Castro, the president's brother, touring storm-damaged areas along the southeast coast.

Dozens of humble wooden homes in sparsely populated rural areas were reduced to mounds of kindling. Corrugated metal roofs were ripped off and twisted by the roaring winds before being scattered across the countryside. A wooden sugar mill was missing its roof and parts of its sides.

The government had not issued damage estimates.

Strong winds and surf buffeted the U.S. detention camp for terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, on the island's eastern end, where a lifeguard tower was washed into the sea. No casualties were reported.

[Last modified July 9, 2005, 23:36:03]