Cyclone heads for West Australia mining region

SYDNEY (Reuters) - A powerful cyclone off the Western Australia coast was showing signs of intensifying and was likely to cross the country's remote Pilbara mining region over the next two days.

Australia's Bureau of Meteorology said on Saturday Tropical Cyclone Nicholas was traveling slowly and was 510 km (320 miles) north north-east of Karratha. On current predictions, it is expected to intensify to a Category 4 cyclone from category 2 currently.

"Nicholas has been moving on a westerly track but is expected to take a south southwest track towards the Pilbara coast later today and during Sunday," the Bureau said.

"Nicholas is showing signs of further intensification and there is a risk of a severe tropical cyclone crossing the Pilbara coast on late Monday or Tuesday."

The sparsely populated Pilbara region, some 1,900 km (1,180 miles) north of Perth, is home to scores of iron ore, manganese, nickel and bauxite deposits as well as nearby offshore oil and gas wells.

Australian oil and gas producer Santos Ltd has already shut off their oil fields off Western Australia due to the cyclone. Another Australian oil producer AED Oil Ltd earlier in the week, stopped production at its oil field in the Timor Sea, due to developing storms in the area.

Chevron and Woodside Petroleum Ltd, which operate the 73,000 barrels per day Cossack-Pioneer oil field in the Karratha region, have said their operations were not yet affected.

Last March, a powerful cyclone in the region forced oil companies, including Santos and Woodside Petroleum, to shut about 180,000 barrels a day of production, half of Australia's output, for nearly a week.

Residents were urged to prepare a plan before the cyclone struck.