Hurricane Gustav tears up homes in rural west Cuba with 150-mph winds

Hurricane Gustav tears up homes in rural west Cuba with 150-mph winds
By Ray Sanchez | Havana Bureau
September 1, 2008

Paso Real, Cuba - Cuba's experience is a lesson for Louisiana.

"It was like the town was surrounded by roaring locomotives," Marisela
Romero Cardozo, 52, a teacher, said Sunday. "The walls shook. The sound
was deafening. You thought the world was ending."

Meteorologists said Hurricane Gustav made landfall Saturday with
sustained winds of 150 mph and gusts 50 mph stronger — the most powerful
hurricane to hit here in 60 years.

It ripped rows of trees and power poles from the ground and left them in
tangled masses along the highway from Havana. The storm surge pushed
seawater inland more than two miles along the island's southern coast.

In Paso Real, a town of 3,000 in hard-hit Pinar del Rio province, almost
every house showed damage, power lines were knocked down, windows were
shattered and dozens of roofs were blown off homes. The local school,
grocery store, train station and beauty parlor were destroyed.

"You could see pieces of roofs flying around like missiles," said Teresa
Liz Negrin, who ventured out Sunday despite a steady rain to check on
neighbors in Paso Real. "You never saw anything like that here."

The sprawling storm intensified just before coming ashore and battered
the island for more than seven hours as it crossed western Cuba's
tobacco-growing country just short of becoming a top-scale Category 5
hurricane. It sent parked cars flying, toppled radio towers and knocked
out electricity from the southern shore to Cuba's capital.

Cuban officials on Sunday reported widespread flooding and destruction
of homes, schools, medical facilities, warehouses and infrastructure in
Cuba's westernmost province and the Isle of Youth.

Although dozens were injured, no one was hurt seriously or killed by the
storm, which claimed at least 81 lives in the Caribbean.

Cuban officials evacuated more than 300,000 people in advance of the
storm and promised the continued distribution of food for people in the
affected areas. Sunday morning, however, the national press reported
severe damage to roads in much of the region, complicating relief efforts.

Surveying the aftermath, Norma Rojas Guzman, 48, her daughter and
grandson stood outside what little remained of the family's wood and
concrete house in Paso Real. Gustav destroyed the roof, the front door,
the front porch and several walls.

"We're waiting to see where we go," Rojas said, as her daughter's eyes
welled with tears. "From a neighbor's house, I watched as our home
disappeared in the wind."

Her husband, Ramon Alberto Pacheco, said the close-knit community's
recovery would be lengthy.

"We were lucky. We're still here to tell the world what happened," he
said. "But it will take decades to rebuild."

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

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