Associated Press
HAVANA — Cuba, its economy already battered by a drop in tourism, began adding up the destruction Tuesday from Hurricane Michelle, which killed at least five people, flooded crops, destroyed at least 2,000 homes and crippled the island’s infrastructure.
Although the communist government had not yet offered a comprehensive damage report, there were early indications of significant destruction of some crops and the island’s electrical and telecommunications systems.
Agricultural damage was particularly severe in the central province of Matanzas, where 99,000 tons of oranges were lost, the Communist Party daily Granma said Tuesday.
Tobacco seed beds for the plants used to make Cuba’s famed cigars were wiped out by the storm, Granma said. The province’s crop of plantains, a staple food in this Caribbean nation, was also devastated, the newspaper said.
Cuba’s national defense confirmed five deaths nationwide. Officials said at least 10,000 homes had been damaged in Matanzas province, of which 2,000 were destroyed.
Damage to telephone lines and microwave antennae that provide long-distance service snarled communications Tuesday between Havana and outlying regions. As a result, conditions in some parts of the island weren’t clear, making it hard even for the government to assess damage.
Electricity on Tuesday was gradually being restored throughout Havana and Pinar del Rio province.
The entire western half of the country was blacked out two nights following Michelle’s landfall Sunday afternoon. Power was shut down by the government as a precaution when the hurricane struck.
The hurricane, which killed 12 people in Honduras, Nicaragua and Jamaica last week, lost some strength as it moved off Cuba, and left Florida virtually untouched. Authorities had ordered the Florida Keys evacuated.
Tuesday afternoon, the weakening storm was centered about 230 miles south-southwest of Bermuda, where a tropical storm warning was canceled.
Before moving to the Bahamas, the hurricane’s outer winds brushed Florida, where a tropical storm warning was lifted Monday afternoon for the Atlantic coast from the Upper Keys to the West Palm Beach area.
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