Mexico City - After being battered by Hurricane Gustav the Caribbean is now being hit by tropical storm Hanna, which left at least 19 dead in Haiti on Tuesday, according to local media.

Hanna, which has been nearly stationary for the past few hours, dumped rain and blasted winds at Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Cuba.

Ten people drowned as the storm flooded Haiti's third-largest city, Gonaives, 152 kilometres north of Port-au-Prince, where water levels reached 3 metres in some areas, reported Mayor Stephen Moise to the Haiti news agency.

President René Preval asked for international help for the 300,000 residents of the city that is completely cut off.

Gustav killed 77 people and left eight others missing in Haiti, and another eight dead in the Dominican Republic. Two more tropical storms - Ike and Josephine - are forming and approaching the Caribbean.

The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) in Miami forecast Hanna, currently with maximum sustained winds of 100 kilometres per hour, would strengthen into a hurricane-force storm and head northward over the Bahamas to the US coastline near the Florida-Georgia border or South Carolina early Wednesday.

Tropical storm winds extended out 320 kilometres from Hanna's centre.

Coming up behind Hanna is Tropical Storm Ike, which is moving westward across the Atlantic with top winds of 100 kph and could become a hurricane by Wednesday, predicted the NHC.

Tropical Storm Josephine, with top winds of about 85 kph, is moving westward over the far eastern Atlantic and could also near hurricane force by Wednesday or Thursday. (dpa)