Rescue workers yesterday were scrambling to clean up the mess left by Hurricane Lidia, which slammed into Mexico’s Pacific coast overnight, leaving one person dead in the western state of Nayarit, before it was downgraded to a tropical storm.
Hours after slamming into the coast as an “extremely dangerous” Category 4 hurricane, Lidia had weakened to a tropical storm as it headed northeast across the country, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in an update, adding that it would continue producing heavy rainfall and gusty winds as it moves inland.
The storm triggered torrential downpours, causing rivers to overflow, toppling trees and leading to significant flooding in numerous western states of Mexico.
Photo: Reuters
Officials in Nayarit were working to clear fallen trees obstructing Federal Highway 200 in the Bahia de Banderas municipality.
The authorities reported that 136 people sought overnight shelter in temporary accommodations set up within the municipality.
Ahead of its arrival, the government deployed about 6,000 members of the armed forces to help residents, said Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who urged people to take shelter.
A man died when a tree fell on the car he was driving during strong winds in Bahia de Banderas, authorities said.
Lidia came ashore near the popular beach resort of Puerto Vallarta, packing maximum sustained winds of about 220kph, the NHC said.
The storm had quickly strengthened to the second-highest category on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale before reaching land.
Early yesterday, its maximum sustained winds had dropped to 113kph and it was expected to rapidly lose strength, the NHC said.
In Puerto Vallarta — a major destination for Mexican and foreign tourists — shopkeepers earlier boarded up windows and piled up sandbags in case of flooding.
Waves crashed ashore, heavy rain drenched the city and strong winds whipped palm trees.
Civil defense authorities in Puerto Vallarta catalogued the damage on social media, reporting inundated canals and instances of rooftops being swept away by the storm.
School classes were suspended, businesses closed early and most residents waited out the storm at home or in shelters opened by the authorities, Agence France-Presse reporters said.
Some people were still seen in the streets, taken by surprise by the speed of the hurricane’s arrival.
“I was going to go home, but it’s very far away. I’m going to have to take shelter somewhere else. There’s no transportation. It caught me off guard,” said Herson Rodriguez, a 35-year-old fitness trainer and nutritionist.
Lidia was expected to bring rainfall of up to 30cm to Nayarit, Sinaloa, and Jalisco states, the NHC said.
“These rains will likely produce flash and urban flooding, along with possible mudslides in areas of higher terrain near the coast,” it warned.
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