Hurricane Ike swirled over the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday, targeting Texas near the US offshore oil patch after toppling decrepit buildings in Cuba's capital and ripping the island from end to end.

Ike, a Category 1 storm but strengthening late on Tuesday with 80 mile-per-hour (130 kph) winds, left a long trail of destruction across the Caribbean and had energy companies fearful it could do the same to their Gulf oil rigs as they scurried to evacuate workers and shut down production.

Forecasters said Ike would likely regain power in the Gulf's warm waters and become a major storm again, revving up to a Category 3 on the five-step hurricane intensity scale with a minimum of 115 mph (178 kph) winds. But latest projections pointed Ike toward the middle of the Texas coast, skirting to the west of the main region for offshore production in the Gulf, which provides a quarter of US oil and 15 percent of its natural gas.

The US National Hurricane Center in Miami warned that its projections were subject to change.

New Orleans, still scarred by Katrina, which killed 1,500 people and caused $80 billion in damage on the US Gulf Coast in 2005, appeared to be out of danger. - Reuters