A slightly weakened Gustav -- still a dangerous Category 3 storm with winds near 125 miles (205 kilometers) per hour -- battered Cuba Sunday after claiming at least 81 lives in its tear across the Dominican Republic, Haiti and Jamaica.

Los Palacios, in the western tobacco-growing Pinar del Rio province, was one of Cuba's first municipalities to be thrashed by Gustav late Saturday.

"It's the end of the world. We're going to take 20 years to recover," said 32-year-old resident Jose Rodriguez as he stared across the debris-strewn streets.

Some 7,000 homes, most made of wood with tile roofs, in the town of Los Palacios -- of 17,000 inhabitants -- some 60 miles (100 kilometers) west of the capital Havana, were no match for the raging storm.

During the night, roof tiles launched by Gustav flew around the streets like rockets as wind and rain hammered and damaged churches, schools and poultry plants.

"The 1944 cyclone was big, but this was bigger," said 70-year-old Armando Gonzalez, who had to be evacuated with his family after his house collapsed almost immediately.

His 71-year-old wife Irma Mayra sobbed as rescue workers led her to safety.

"The tiles flew off the roof, we have no kitchen left," she said.

Nearby, an avocado tree that managed to resist the storm had shattered pieces of roof tiles wedged deeply into its trunk like bullets.

"A year's work of repairs and painting for July 26 (a national holiday) was lost in an hour and a half," Ricardo Rodriguez, a journalist for Radio Guama, after a visiting damaged areas with rescue services.

"There's serious damage to all the municipality's infrastructure, the telephone network is down, they've lost rice and yucca (plantain) crops and a lot of state businesses are affected, said Emilio Triana, president of the Defense Council.

"But we only have seven injuries," added Triana, who directed the evacuation of more than 17,000 of the municipality's 39,000 inhabitants.

Material damage was overwhelming across the area, though.

The "Guayabera" tailor's shop was one of dozens to lose its roof, windows and doors.

Damage in nearby districts -- including Candelaria, Bahia Honda, San Cristobal and La Palma -- was widespread too.

As they assessed the storm damage, residents shared experiences of the night's disturbance.

In the middle of the storm on Saturday evening, the rain and wind stopped for a half an hour.

In bright light, residents spilled onto the streets as authorities rushed to warn them: "It's the eye of the storm, return to your homes."

Half an hour later, rain and strong winds once again battered Los Palacios, as residents waited for calm, with no electricity and unable to sleep as the wind howled.

earlier related report
With prized TVs and pigs, Cubans flee as Gustav nears
With TV sets and bundles of clothes strapped to their backs, and some leading a prized pig on a leash, Cubans rushed to evacuate this south coast fishing town Saturday as deadly Hurricane Gustav closed in.

The monster storm, which has killed at least 81 people in the Dominican Republic, Haiti and Jamaica, on Saturday tore across the Isle of Youth, a low-lying island home to more than 200,000 people off the southwest Cuban mainland, ahead of its mainland strike.

Much of Batabano, which lies about 70 kilometers (40 miles) south of Havana, and other nearby villages looked like ghost towns Saturday ahead of the storm. Civil Defense in the Americas' only communist country ordered the complete evacuation of the village of Surgidero, in the Batabano area, which usually sustains coastal flooding during hurricanes.

Just as in Batabano, more than 190,000 residents were evacuating small fishing towns of Cortes, La Bajada and La Coloma, in Pinar del Rio province west of Havana.

In rain boots and yellow and orange raincoats, many looked desperate, searching for a school bus or other government vehicle on which to head out to shelters.

In Batabano, Mayde Garcia, 38, had other priorities: she was leading her 100-kilo white pig Nina (Girl) down the street on a leash, looking like a outsized dog out of her pen. Locals helped lift the sow into a horse-drawn cart to make the trip to the shelter.

"She is pregnant, and we just cannot lose her," Garcia said.

Some locals had television sets and other home appliances tied on their backs, while hauled off valuable refrigerators in carts or horse-drawn carriages.

Maria Perez, 31, was not waiting any longer. Weighed down by a stereo, a fan and a bicycle, she and her son Jose, 8, were headed to a relative's home to sit out the storm.

Most of those leaving here were headed to friends' homes in the town center, which lies on higher ground. Some were going to shelters where medical teams were already on duty, Marisela Vadell, the local official in charge of the evacuation, told AFP.

"We have made handing out food a priority," she said early in the day as people queued for supplies.

Three years ago, hurricane Wilma soaked this fishing town with flooding reaching almost a kilometer inland.

And Saturday, with Gustav looming, authorities suspended the twice-daily catamaran service between Batabano and the Isle of Youth.

"I came here to pick up my daughter because in this area the flooding can get up to your chest," said Roberto Garcia, 61, who with the help of his sons in law tossed a TV, refrigerator and stereo into a cart they were pulling with an old tractor.

Antonio Guerra, a 48-year-old farmer, drives a 1956 truck in great condition which he normally uses to take his crops to market. But every time a hurricane nears, he heads down to low-lying Surgidero to evacuate friends.

"I have eight friends in town that I always take back to the Batabano" town center, said Guerra, who collected Raul Herro, 57, from his home which during hurricane Wilma had one meter (three feet) of water inside.

Herro, as he has before, evacuates with his appliances and leaves his furniture hung from the rafters of his living room on ropes.

"I am not afraid because even if there is no one in town, the police and authorities are always watching and taking care of things," said his wife Marisel Martinez, 43.

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