Tropical Storm Irene aims for Puerto Rico after lashing Leewards

ST JOHN'S, Antigua (CMC):

Tropical Storm Irene barrelled through the Caribbean yesterday on a track which was expected to take it past Puerto Rico's southern coast early today.

The storm is expected to strengthen into a hurricane as it approaches the Dominican Republic.

Yesterday, Irene whipped the northern Leeward Islands with rain and squalls forcing the authorities to shut down airports in Antigua, St Kitts and the British Virgin Islands.

Residents of the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico started experiencing tropical storm conditions yesterday afternoon while residents of the Dominican Republic braced for the worst this morning.

Meantime, the Antigua-based regional airline LIAT said flights in its northern network will continue to be affected as Tropical Storm Irene moves into that area.

Closed

"Flights in LIAT's southern network are operating normally," the airline's spokesman Desmond Brown said, adding that services into and out of Antigua should resume once the V.C. Bird International Airport reopens.

Brown said the airport in St Kitts would likely be closed until late yesterday while the airport in the British Virgin Islands was not expected to reopen until this morning.

Dominican Republic authorities issued a hurricane warning for the southern coast of the tourism-dependent nation, while Puerto Rico declared a hurricane watch.

Tropical storm warnings were in effect for most of the north-eastern Caribbean islands, and for Haiti.

Computer forecast models late yesterday showed Irene taking a north-westward path over Haiti and eastern and central Cuba and then heading toward the Florida peninsula.