Hurricane Matthew's 'life-threatening winds' bearing down on Haiti
The towns and villages of Haiti's southwestern peninsula battened down as best they could early Tuesday for a nightlong lashing by life-threatening winds, rains and storm surge unleashed by powerful Hurricane Matthew.

The dangerous Category 4 storm was also dropping heavy rains on other parts of Haiti, the hemisphere's poorest country where many people live in flimsy shacks in areas prone to flooding. Heavy rain also fell on Jamaica and dangerous rainfall was a threat for the Dominican Republic, which adjoins Haiti.

Matthew had maximum sustained winds of 230 kph early Tuesday, and forecasters said its slowly advancing centre would likely pass near or over Haiti's southwestern tip after dawn. It would continue on for another landfall expected in the lightly populated eastern end of Cuba, the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said.

"We are looking at a dangerous hurricane that is heading into the vicinity of western Haiti and eastern Cuba," said Richard Pasch, a senior hurricane specialist with the centre. "People who are impacted by things like flooding and mudslides hopefully would get out and relocate because that's where we have seen loss of life in the past."

As of 5 a.m. ET, the storm was centred about 320 kilometres southwest of Cap-Haitien, Haiti, and 270 kilometres south of the eastern tip of Cuba. It was moving north near 15 kph.The centre said in its 2 a.m. advisory that life-threatening wind, rain and storm surge were beginning to spread over portions of Haiti.

In the Port-au-Prince suburb of Tabarre, officials spent Monday urging shantytown residents living next to a muddy river to take shelter at a local school where cots were set up. While some went, many refused in fear their few possessions might be stolen.

"If we lose our things we are not going to get them back!" Toussaint Laine said as police and officials from the mayor's office urged the jobless man and his family to evacuate.

Vendors sell their goods on the street while Hurricane Matthew approaches in Port-au-Prince, Haiti on Monday. (Carlos Garcia Rawlins/Reuters)

Haiti's civil protection agency reported the death of a fisherman in rough water churned up by the storm. Agency chief Marie Alta Jean-Baptiste said another fisherman was missing.

The confirmed death in Haiti brought the total for the storm to at least three. One man died Friday in Colombia and a 16-year-old was killed in St. Vincent and the Grenadines on Sept. 28 when the system passed through the eastern Caribbean.

Authorities went door to door in Haiti's south coast cities of Les Cayes and Jeremie to make sure people were aware of the storm. At least 1,200 people were moved to shelters in churches and schools.

"We are continuing to mobilize teams in the south to move people away from dangerous areas," Jean-Baptiste said.

There is no shortage of people with flimsy houses set up in risky places in Haiti. In an unregulated sprawl of shacks built on hillsides near the northern edge of Haiti's capital, some poor families did what they could to reinforce their tin-and-tarp houses. But most were just hoping for the best.

"I know my house could easily blow away. All I can do is pray and then pray some more," Ronlande Francois said by the tarp-walled shack where she lives with her unemployed husband and three children.

A girl watches as the authorities arrive to evacuate people from her house in Tabarre, Haiti on Monday. (Dieu Nalio Chery/Associated Press)

In Port-au-Prince, schools were closed while cars lined up at gas stations and shoppers cleared shelves at supermarkets as rain fell.

Some worried the crowded capital might not fare well. "We are not prepared," unemployed mason Fritz Achelus said as he watched water pool on a downtown street.

Forecasters said the storm could dump as much as 100 centimetres of rain on some isolated areas of Haiti, raising fears of deadly mudslides and floods in the heavily deforested country.

In Jamaica, which lowered a hurricane warning to a tropical storm warning as Matthew tracked closer to Haiti, many people chose to stick out the rough rain and winds at home. Local Government Minister Desmond McKenzie said all but four residents of the Port Royal area near the Kingston airport refused to board buses and evacuate.

Matthew briefly reached the top classification, Category 5, becoming the strongest hurricane in the region since Felix in 2007.

The U.S. hurricane center said the storm appeared to be on track to pass east of Florida through the Bahamas, but it was too soon to predict with certainty whether it would threaten the U.S. East Coast.

"Although our track is to the east of Florida, interests there should remain vigilant and we can't rule out the possibility of impacts," Pasch said.

A hurricane warning was posted for much of the Bahamas, where the storm was expected to move along the eastern length of the island chain starting early Wednesday.

Cuba's government declared a hurricane alert for six eastern provinces and removed traffic lights from poles in the city of Santiago to keep them from falling due to heavy wind.

Children in the Cuban community of Cecilia, in Guantanamo Province, carry belongings in an evacuation order on Monday. (Yamil Lage/AFP/Getty Images)

Matthew's center was expected to make landfall in Cuba about 80 kilometres east of the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, where authorities evacuated about 700 spouses and children of service members on military transport planes to Florida.

The U.S. installation has a population of about 5,500, including 61 men held at the detention center for terrorism suspects. Navy Capt. David Culpepper, the base commander, said emergency shelters had been set up and authorities were bracing for storm surge and heavy rain that could threaten some low-lying areas, including around the power plant and water desalination facility.

"We have no choice but to prepare ourselves to take a frontal assault if you will," Culpepper said.
Please write a summary below.
The leading edge of dangerous Hurricane Matthew drenched Haiti on Monday night, flooding streets and sending people scrambling to emergency shelters as the Category 4 storm threatened to batter the hemisphere's poorest nation overnight with life-threatening winds, rains and storm surge.
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