Guantanamo on alert ahead of Tropical Storm Isaac

US NAVAL BASE GUANTANAMO BAY: Soldiers at Guantanamo Bay, who guard the pretrial hearings for the alleged September 11 plotters, were busy Thursday preparing to protect the US base from Tropical Storm Isaac.

This American enclave in eastern Cuba finds itself in the projected path of the ferocious weather system that forecasters predict could become a hurricane as early as Thursday.

Ahead of the storm, the US military announced Wednesday it had postponed the preliminary hearings, already delayed due to the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and a technical glitch.

As nonessential personnel who do not live on the base were told to leave the island, the focus turned to securing the facility with sandbags.

"We sandbag anything we know where there is a flooding risk," sergeant Jessica Brown told as she led a team of roughly 10 young men in the stifling tropical heat.

At the port, donning a white construction helmet and shielding his eyes with sunglasses, lieutenant David Moore monitored the hoisting of a landing craft by an enormous crane.

"This is in preparation for the expected storm. We take the watercraft we can from the water and secure them on land," he said. "They could damage themselves or damage the piers."

The 16 vessels include two ferries that link the airport with the rest of the base.

Some 5,600 civilians and military personnel are normally on the base, leased by the United States since 1903 and known for the detention of so-called enemy combatants -- individuals suspected of belonging to Al-Qaeda who have been captured since 2001.

Several hundred people will have been evacuated as a precaution by Thursday -- excluding the 168 prisoners who include the self-proclaimed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

Mohammed and several of his alleged deputies have been detained at the US-run Guantanamo prison since 2006 after being held at secret CIA-run prisons where they say they were tortured.

Their trial is not expected to begin for at least a year.

Preliminary hearings were to have begun Thursday and run through August 28, but judge James Pohl delayed them "due to weather" without setting a new date.

The lawyers, judge and prosecutor have all been evacuated from the base.