Jamaica was placed on a tropical storm watch yesterday as Tropical Storm Noel formed over the Caribbean and forecasters warned the slow-moving system could send flash floods rushing over deforested hills in Haiti before it heads on to Cuba.

The strengthening storm poses a serious threat to impoverished Haiti, which is still recovering from floods that killed at least 37 and sent more than 4,000 people to shelters earlier this month.

Noel, the 14th named storm of the Atlantic season, had sustained winds of about 60 mph (96 kph), according to the US National Hurricane Centre in Miami. The outer bands of the tropical system were dumping heavy rains on the island of Hispaniola late yesterday.

The meandering storm was spinning north-northwest at roughly 5 mph (8 kph), which would bring its centre near the south-eastern peninsula of Haiti early today. A tropical storm warning was issued for the entire Haitian coastline and parts of neighbouring Dominican Republic’s southern coast.

Forecasters said Noel, with tropical storm force winds fanning 115 miles (185 kilometres) from its centre, could drop 12 inches (30 centimetres) of water on Hispaniola, south-eastern Cuba and Jamaica.

Yesterday, the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) warned fishermen and small craft operators that sea conditions were expected to deteriorate, with showers, thunderstorms and strong winds.

Motorists were also advised to avoid using the Bog Walk Gorge as rains from the storm started pelting the island from Saturday night.

A tropical storm warning and a hurricane watch were issued for south-eastern parts of Cuba, including the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay holding some 330 detainees.

“I don’t envision the storm will have any tangible impacts on detention operations as the modern facilities have been constructed to withstand high winds and significant rainfall,” said Navy Commander Jeffrey Gordon, a Pentagon spokesman.

A long-term forecast carries the storm across Cuba and towards the Bahamas.

At 8:00 pm EDT (0000 GMT), Noel’s centre was roughly 135 miles (215 kilometres) south-southeast of the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, according to US forecasters.

Swollen rivers forced evacuations in Cabaret, a town north of Port-au-Prince where floods killed at least 23 people earlier this month, said Marie Alta Jean-Baptiste, director of Haiti’s civil protection agency.

“We are working hard to make sure everything goes well and that every citizen knows a cyclone is coming,” Jean-Baptiste said.

Flood concerns on Saturday forced three US senators to cut short a trip to Haiti, where they’d planned to survey damage caused by earlier storms.

Widespread deforestation and poor drainage mean that even moderate rains can cause devastation in Haiti, where thousands of people build ramshackle homes in flood plains.

In 2004, the Caribbean nation took a deadly hit from Tropical Storm Jeanne, which triggered flooding and mudslides that killed more than 2,000 people and destroyed thousands of acres of fertile land. That storm later strengthened into a hurricane.

The Associated Press and Observer reporters