Storm claims 4 lives in Haiti

PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti – At least four people, including a ten-year old girl, were killed after Tropical Storm Isaac drenched the French Speaking Caribbean Community (CARICOM) country with up to 20 inches of rain and swept out towards Cuba today.
The Miami-based National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in its 2 pm (local time) bulletin that the storm with winds of near 60 miles per hour (mph) was now near the north coast of Eastern Cuba.
The Cuban government has already declared a state of alert in six provinces and evacuated thousands of people from high risk areas.
A ten-year-old girl died when a wall fell on her in the capital, Port-au-Prince and the British aid charity Oxfam said it knew of three other deaths. A woman and a child in the rural Souvenance, were reported killed.
Haiti is still recovering from the 2010 earthquake that killed an estimated 300,000 people and more than 400 000 others are now living in tents and had no option but to weather the storm under the canvas tents.
Aid agencies said that at one site, more than 50 tents collapsed, forcing people to search the mud for their belongings.
Haiti’s national electricity supplier said that 30 out of the country’s 32 electricity grids were down and in the capital, people were being evacuated to areas behind the presidential palace and also to a stadium. (CMC)