US President George W. Bush warned the storm could cause levees to break if it does eventually hit near New Orleans, where engineers are still battling to repair floodgates smashed by Hurricane Katrina on August 29.

The likelihood of Rita barreling over the oil-rich Gulf of Mexico also sent world crude prices surging Monday.

Rita pounded islands of the southern Bahamas Monday morning and was expected to strengthen into a hurricane later in the day. Forecasters said it could eventually reach category three on the five-level Saffir-Simpson hurricane intensity scale.

While the Bahamas, Cuba and southern Florida were the most immediately threatened, with Texas at risk over the weekend, hurricane experts warned there was also a possibility the storm might make slam ashore near New Orleans.

Bill Doran, the operations division chief for the Louisiana Office of Homeland Security said that authorities were keeping a close eye on Rita.

"If we had an event come towards New Orleans, I believe we would get more water in the area," he said adding: "You would have to evacuate at about 72 hours from landfall to have an effective evacuation."

He said as many as 30,000 people, most of them national guardsmen and relief workers, might need to be evacuated if Rita were to strike the US Gulf Coast areas recovering from Katrina's wrath.

Officials already ordered the evacuation of Key West and nearby areas in the Florida Keys, a chain of islands linked to the mainland by a series of bridges and a single road. The storm could hit the area late Tuesday or early Wednesday on its way to the Gulf of Mexico.

Miami, 350 kilometers (220 miles) away, as well as areas further north were also on alert.

Florida Governor Jeb Bush, a brother of the US president, warned residents not to underestimate the threat of the storm.

"We've been watching the effects and the tragedies that unfold after Hurricane Katrina and its awesome force," he said, adding: "I urge people to take this storm seriously."

The US National Hurricane Center forecast a track that would have the storm just skirting the Bahamas, Cuba and Key West in Atlantic waters and eventually making landfall in Texas over the weekend.

But experts warn that hurricanes are highly unpredictable and a so-called "cone of probability" in the forecast covers a huge swath of the US Gulf Coast, stretching from northeastern Mexico to the swamplands of southern Louisiana just west of New Orleans.

Should the storm land west of New Orleans, the city would find itself on the so-called "dirty side" of the hurricane, where winds are the most powerful.

"There is deep concern about this storm causing more flooding in New Orleans," the US president said. "And again, if it were to rain a lot, there is concern from the Army Corps of Engineers that the levees might break."

Rita sent jitters on global oil markets amid fears of further disruption of crude production in the US Gulf, which had been severely affected by Hurricane Katrina.

New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in October climbed more than four dollars to 67.25 dollars per barrel in electronic trading Monday.

At 2:00 p.m. (1800 GMT) Rita was 600 kilometers (380 miles) east-southeast of Key West, and packed near-hurricane strength winds of 115 kilometers per hour (70 mph.)

Meanwhile, another storm, Hurricane Philippe, was swirling 585 kilometers (385 miles) east of the Leeward Islands and looked set to remain over the open waters of the Atlantic.

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