PORT-AU-PRINCE: At least two people died in Haiti Saturday when Tropical Storm Isaac battered the impoverished Caribbean nation with torrential rains and high winds.
An eight-year-old girl died when a wall collapsed at her home, a government official, Gonzague Day, told AFP.
And a 51-year-old woman was killed by a collapsing roof, the country's civil protection agency said.
These were the first known deaths related to the storm, which was set to sweep across Cuba later Saturday.
The Miami-based National Hurricane Center said Isaac was near hurricane strength when the eye of the storm passed over Haiti, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere even before a 2010 earthquake killed 250,000 people.
Some 400,000 are still living in squalid, makeshift tent camps in and around the devastated capital Port-au-Prince, raising concerns that the death toll could rise after a more complete assessment of the storm's damage.
Day, a government representative from western Haiti, said more than 3,300 families were sent to temporary shelters, including many from those camps.
Isaac was 40 miles (65 kilometers) southeast of Cuba as it swirled to the northwest with winds of up to 60 miles (95 kilometers) per hour, the NHC said in its latest bulletin, issued at 2:00 pm (1800 GMT).
After striking southeastern Cuba, home to the US naval base and "war on terror" prison at Guantanamo Bay, US forecasters say Isaac could strengthen to hurricane force before hitting Florida Sunday.
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