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MIAMI, Florida (CNN) -- Tropical Storm Fay was dumping heavy rain Saturday morning on Haiti and the Dominican Republic, with some places expected to receive up to 12 inches, the National Hurricane Center said.

"These rains could produce life-threatening flash floods and mudslides," forecasters said.

At 8 a.m. ET, Fay was west-northwest of Port au Prince, Haiti, and about 170 miles east-southeast of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, site of the U.S. detention center for terror suspects.

The storm, the sixth of the 2008 Atlantic season, formed Friday over the Dominican Republic in the Caribbean Sea.

Fay had maximum sustained winds near 45 mph with higher gusts. Tropical storm-force winds extended outward up to 105 miles.

Forecasters said Fay was moving west near 14 mph. The storm was expected to turn toward the west-northwest later Saturday, then head northwest by Sunday night.

"On this track, the center of Fay will move across Haiti this morning, and will be moving near the southern coast of eastern and central Cuba tonight and Sunday," the center said.

A tropical storm warning was in effect for the entire coast of Haiti, the Turks and Caicos Islands, the southeastern Bahamas and the Cuban provinces of Guantanamo, Santiago de Cuba and Granma.

The Dominican Republic has discontinued all tropical storm warnings for its coast, forecasters said.

A tropical storm warning means that tropical storm conditions are expected in the warning area within the next 24 hours.

A tropical storm watch covered the Cuban provinces of Holguin and Las Tunas and the central Bahamas. Tropical storm conditions are also possible in the provinces of central Cuba within the next 36 hours.

The hurricane center's advisory said residents of western Cuba, Jamaica, the Florida Keys and the southern Florida Peninsula should monitor Fay's movements.

Various computer models put the storm's long-range track "up the western portion of the Florida Peninsula in a few days," while others place it farther west over the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the center said.

Fay is expected to dump 4 to 8 inches of rain over Hispaniola, the island shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic; eastern and central Cuba; Jamaica; and the northern Cayman Islands with isolated amounts of up to 12 inches possible, the center said.

Tides of 1 to 2 feet above normal levels can be expected in the warning area.