NASA decided to haul the space shuttle Discovery off its launch pad and out of harm's way yesterday as Hurricane Georges headed toward Florida, officials said.
But the shuttle's planned launch next month, with Senator John Glenn aboard, was not expected to be delayed.
Discovery, attached to its fuel tank and twin rocket boosters, was to take shelter from the storm in its 52-storey assembly building, which was built to withstand winds of 125 mph. The outer edge of Hurricane Georges is expected to hit the launch site today or tomorrow, bringing high winds, heavy rain and possible tornadoes.
The storm also held up shuttle Atlantis, which was being flown back to the Florida spaceport after a major refit at a Boeing plant in California.
Atlantis, riding atop a 747 carrier aircraft, would wait out the storm at a US Army air field in Kentucky, a NASA spokesman said.
The hurricane swept westward across Cuba yesterday, claiming at least two victims, and inflicting widespread flooding and damage on the Caribbean island's eastern provinces.
Authorities said a 61-year-old woman died when she left her house in Las Tunas province and stepped on a live electric cable. A 56-year-old man was also electrocuted after driving over a wire on a motorbike.
Cuba's Civil Defence said more than 500,000 people had now been evacuated from danger zones, including several thousand tourists from resorts along the northern coast.