LES CAYES, Haiti (AP):

Hurricane Ernesto slumped back to tropical storm force yesterday, but it lashed Haiti's southern coast with heavy rain, flooding homes and threatening deadly mudslides in the impoverished country as it steamed toward Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico.

'Ernesto' had winds of near 60mph (95kph), down from 75mph (120mph) earlier in the day, when it became the first hurricane of the Atlantic season, according to the United States (U.S.) National Hurricane Center in Miami.

It is projected to intensify again early this week, sweeping through Cuba and threatening the eastern U.S. Gulf coast, prompting Governor Jeb Bush to order the evacuation of tourists from the Florida Keys.

"We do expect it to reach the Gulf, maybe as a Category One hurricane, possibly a Category Two," said John Cangialosi, a meteorologist with the hurricane center. "We expect it to be a significant system as it moves over Florida."

Its forecast track was veering away from New Orleans, which was devastated a year ago tomorrow by Hurricane Katrina.

Storm surge

A storm surge of up to six feet (1.5 to 1.8 metres) sent waves crashing into cinderblock homes on the shoreline of Les Cayes, a town 95 miles (155 kilometres) west of the capital, Port-au-Prince. Residents tied goats and cows under thatched huts and fishermen pulled their nets ashore as the wind bent palm trees.

"I want to get my children out of here but we don't know where to go," said Clena Bruno, a 36-year-old mother of six, who was sweeping water out of her tin-roofed home. Her children used cooking dishes to scoop sand out of the house.

The storm was centred near the south-western tip of Haiti and moving north-west at 8mph (13kph).

"The only thing we can do is just wait and keep our fingers crossed," said Frantz Gregoire, 42, owner of the seaside Bay Club restaurant. He said he was planning to close early and send his workers home if the storm intensified.

Haitian Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis said United Nations peacekeepers helped evacuate people from flooded homes. Twenty-five families were rescued from the Port-au-Prince slum of Martisant, he told a press conference.

Phone lines

The storm destroyed about a dozen homes on the island of Gonave, but it was unclear whether anyone was hurt. Rain and wind also knocked out phone lines in some parts of the country, Alexis said. There were also unconfirmed reports of one person being killed in the port city of Gonaíves, where 3,000 lost their lives in tropical storm floods two years ago.

Emergency officials broadcast radio messages urging people living near rivers and other flood-prone areas to seek shelter.

Ernesto was expected to weaken as it crosses Cuba today, but could strengthen as it emerges in the Gulf of Mexico and heads toward Florida.