The US-run prison at Guantanamo Bay was under a hurricane warning and braced for high winds and heavy rain Friday as intensifying storm Tomas bore down on southeastern Cuba, officials said.

US troops overseeing the prison "have communicated to all detainees news of the impending tropical storm and detainees have secured personal belongs in preparation," Pentagon spokeswoman Major Tanya Bradsher said.

Tropical Storm Tomas was intensifying in the Caribbean and the Miami-based National Hurricane Center said it was likely to strengthen to hurricane status as it nears Haiti and Cuba, two countries separated by just 60 miles (97 kilometers) of sea.

Cuba issued tropical storm warnings for the eastern parts of the island but issued a hurricane warning for Guantanamo province, the NHC said.

"Detainees are secure in sound structures to ensure their safety and well being," Bradsher said Thursday.

There was also a supply of rations, or meals ready to eat (MREs), and sufficient water "for all detainees."

The controversial prison at the US naval base houses 174 detainees considered terrorist suspects by American authorities.

The detention camp is located on a larger naval station at Guantanamo Bay that the United States has controlled for decades, predating communist rule in the island nation.

American officers issued an alert for destructive winds and rain at the base, which is home to roughly 2,500 military personnel and more than 3,000 civilians.

"The base has executed all of its preparations for Tropical Storm Tomas," Commander James Thornton, operations officer at the naval station, said in a statement.

"Our military members, families and civilian residents are ready for the storm," he said.

Hurricane warnings were in effect for Haiti, parts of the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos, while a tropical storm warning was issued for Jamaica and a watch issued for the Dominican Republic — which shares Hispaniola island with Haiti.

The eye of the storm lashed Barbados and left more than a dozen dead in Saint Lucia as a hurricane over the weekend.

Obama pledged immediately after his January 2009 inauguration to close down Guantanamo within a year.

But his ambitious timetable has been indefinitely pushed back as US officials desperately try to resolve the thorny problem of what to do with the inmates still languishing in the remote jail, with Republican lawmakers opposed to transferring the inmates to US soil.

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