Texas and Louisiana coasts under storm watch

BY MARTIN MERZER AND RENATO PEREZ

  Hurricane Lili, a compact but fierce storm, thrashed western Cuba on Tuesday and then refueled in the Gulf of Mexico for an assault Thursday on Texas or Louisiana.

  Hurricane and tropical storm watches were issued from Galveston, Texas, to Pascagoula, Miss., a 390-mile stretch of Gulf Coast that includes the Houston area and New Orleans. Just last week, Tropical Storm Isidore smacked much of that region.

  Forecasters said Lili could strike with winds above 110 mph, a major Category 3 hurricane. Once again, residents boarded up homes, workers evacuated offshore oil rigs and city employees stockpiled sandbags.

  Communications were interrupted with western Cuba, and the full extent of the damage could not be determined.

  But an amateur radio operator on the Isle of Youth reported ''devastating effects,'' including major flooding, downed trees and shredded power lines. He and other
  sources relayed no reports of injuries.

  Hurricane forecasters said Lili's winds increased to 100 mph as it hit western Cuba as a Category 2 storm on the five-category Saffir-Simpson scale. They predicted eight to 12 inches of rain, and a tidal storm surge of eight to 10 feet.

  Cuban authorities evacuated 163,000 people from the region, including 6,000 residents of the Isle of Youth. Many of them had been forced from their homes by Isidore 10 days earlier. All 6,500 residents of the seaside town of La Coloma fled to higher land.

  Amateur radio operators on the Isle of Youth, isolated with no phone service since late Monday, said sheets of rain and driving wind severely damaged buildings and crops.

  ''This is worse than [hurricanes] Isidore and Michelle,'' one radio operator told a Cuban radio station.

  Isidore caused major damage in the same area, especially to agriculture. Last year, Hurricane Michelle killed five Cubans and caused $1.8 billion in damage.

  In Havana, about 125 miles east, residents reported heavy rain and strong wind. Cuban leader Fidel Castro reportedly traveled to Pinar del Río to check on civil defense plans.

  Next, Lili intensified in the Gulf of Mexico and drew a bead on the U.S. Gulf Coast.

  The projected path suggested that the hurricane's core would make landfall Thursday afternoon in western Louisiana south of Lake Charles.

  But nasty weather will begin long before then, and forecasters warned that such projections often change.

  ''Given the spread of the guidance and the uncertainties of the forecast, neither the New Orleans or Houston-Galveston areas are out of danger,'' said forecaster Jack Beven of the National Hurricane Center in West Miami-Dade County.

  Officials ordered a mandatory evacuation this morning for Grand Isle, south of New Orleans.

  Officials in New Orleans considered closing Interstate 10 -- a major evacuation route -- if the highway begins to flood, as it did during Isidore.

  In Terrebonne and St. Bernard parishes, officials stocked up on sandbags.

  Meanwhile, forecasters were pleased to bid farewell to September, the busiest tropical weather month since sophisticated hurricane tracking began in the 1940s -- and possibly since 1851, when less precise record-keeping began.

  Eight named storms and one tropical depression formed last month, as what had been a tame hurricane season exploded into action. Four of those systems
  strengthened into hurricanes.

  ''The gate was held closed for the longest time, but if finally opened,'' said Frank Lepore, a spokesman for the hurricane center. ``The forecasters are tired, but it's a
  good kind of tired. They're satisfied they've done a good job.''

  Herald wire services contributed to this report.