Conditions had already begun deteriorating Saturday in Jamaica, where high waves pounded the coast and flooding temporarily cut the road from the airport to the capital. Authorities said a hurricane watch, already posted for Jamaica and Haiti, could be extended to eastern Cuba later Saturday.
The storm, which reached monstrous Category 5 strength overnight, with winds of 160 miles per hour, weakened slightly Saturday to a Category 4, with maximum sustained winds of 140 miles per hour, according to the National Hurricane Center.
As of 2 p.m., the storm was 400 miles southeast of Kingston, Jamaica and 380 miles southwest of Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
Most projections take the storm east of South Florida. But the National Hurricane Center's five-day forecast shifted to the west since Friday, placing South Florida within the cone of uncertainty, which means there's a chance the region could be hit.
"It is important to remind users that average NHC track forecast errors are around 175 miles at day 4 and 230 miles at day 5," the National Hurricane Center said in its 2 p.m. discussion of the storm. "Therefore, it is too soon to rule out possible hurricane impacts from Matthew in Florida."
Gov. Rick Scott has scheduled a briefing with the state's emergency management director, Bryan Koon, for 4 p.m.
The National Weather Service in Miami said Saturday that the chance of hurricane conditions in South Florida remains less than 5 percent. The odds of the region seeing tropical storm conditions from the fringes of the hurricane are about 20 percent. But both probabilities have been increasing, and the weather service said the storm's course is difficult to predict.
"There remains significant uncertainty in where and how fast Matthew will move beyond this weekend," the service said.
The storm's potential impacts to the area are likely to occur Tuesday through Thursday.
Hurricanes typically travel along the southern rim of the Bermuda high, a region of high pressure that forces hurricanes to stay to the south. As this ridge of high pressure diminishes, however, the storm hook to the north.
Hurricane Matthew is expected to turn northwest Saturday and then to the north. Exactly where these turns takes place could govern the storm's impact on South Florida.
As Matthew skimmed past the northern tip of South America there were reports of heavy flooding and at least one death — the second attributed to the storm.
Authorities said at least 18 houses were damaged along the La Guajira peninsula of Colombia, which has been suffering from a multi-year drought. They said a 67-year-old man was swept away to his death by a flash flood in an area where it hadn't rained for four years.
Local TV broadcast images of cars and tree trunks surging though flooded streets in coastal areas.
Colombian authorities closed access to beaches and urged residents living near the ocean to move inland in preparation for storm surges that they said would be most intense on Saturday.
The storm is expected to weaken to a Category 2 storm as it encounters the mountainous lands of Jamaica, Haiti and Cuba but gain strength again Tuesday as it passes over the open waters around the Bahamas. By Thursday it is projected to regain major hurricane status, which means a Category 3 storm, with winds of 119 to 129 miles per hour, or stronger.
Forecasters said rainfall totals could reach 10 to 15 inches (25 to 38 centimeters) with isolated maximum amounts of 25 inches (63 centimeters) in Jamaica and southwestern Haiti.
Kingston, in the southeastern corner of Jamaica, is expected to experience flooding. The government issued a hurricane watch on Friday, and a tropical storm watch was issued for Haiti's southwest coast form the southern border it shares with the Dominican Republic to the capital of Port-au-Prince.
In Haiti, civil protection officials broadcast warnings of a coming storm surge and big waves, saying the country would be "highly threatened" from the approaching system over the next 72 hours. They urged families to prepare emergency food and water kits.
Emergency management authorities banned boating starting Saturday, particularly along the impoverished country's southern coastline, but numerous fishing skiffs could still be seen off the south coast.
dfleshler@sun-sentinel.com, 954-356-4535
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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