Tourists flee huge Hurricane Wilma in Mexico
Roaring waves pounded Mexican beach resorts on Thursday and thousands of tourists were ready to be evacuated as powerful Hurricane Wilma plowed through the Caribbean on its way to Florida.
Cuba evacuated 100,000 people and residents of southern Florida stocked up on drinking water and gas to prepare for Wilma, which spun off the coasts of Mexico and Belize packing winds of around 145 mph (230 kph).
Described by forecasters as extremely dangerous, Wilma killed 10 people in mudslides in Haiti earlier in the week.
Expensive beachfront hotels all along Mexico’s “Maya Riviera” coast emptied of tourists who escaped to shelters. The normally calm, turquoise Caribbean heaved and frothed.
“We are trying to stay calm but we are freaking out inside,” said Kerry Rieth, a tourist from Pennsylvania in the cloud-covered resort of Cancun. Winds were strong and heavy rains were expected later in the day.
Wilma became the strongest Atlantic storm on record in terms of barometric pressure on Wednesday. It weakened to a Category 4 hurricane but was expected to strengthen again before slamming into Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula on Friday.
“Believe me, this is still a very, very powerful hurricane,” said Max Mayfield, director of the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami.
More: abcnews.go.com
UPDATE 4-Tourists flee huge Hurricane Wilma in Mexico
Roaring waves pounded Mexican beach resorts on Thursday and thousands of tourists were ready to be evacuated as powerful Hurricane Wilma ploughed through the Caribbean on its way to Florida.
Cuba evacuated 100,000 people and residents of southern Florida stocked up on drinking water and gas to prepare for Wilma, which spun off the coasts of Mexico and Belize packing winds of around 145 mph (230 kph).
Described by forecasters as extremely dangerous, Wilma killed 10 people in mudslides in Haiti earlier in the week.
Expensive beachfront hotels all along Mexico's "Maya Riviera" coast emptied of
Wilma slams Mexico resorts, tourists flee
Lashing wind and rain pounded Mexican beach resorts on Friday and thousands of tourists hunkered down in shelters to escape Hurricane Wilma, which was hammering Caribbean resorts on its way to densely populated southern Florida. Heavy rain was coming down in diagonal sheets and howling winds were buckling sturdy trees.
Tourists were evacuated from luxury beachfront hotels all along Mexico’s “Maya Riviera†coast and the normally calm, turquoise Caribbean seas heaved and Wilma dumped rain on streets patrolled by soldiers ordering people to take cover.
Described by forecasters as extremely dangerous and at its height later
Mexico's Cozumel, storm survivor, awaits tourists
At first glance, Mexico's Cozumel island -- a Caribbean jewel ringed with coral reefs -- looks like the site of a nuclear explosion.
Chunks of concrete pier have been swept away, palm-thatched beachside bars are stripped to skeletons, lush forest has turned into dry brown kindling and huge bites have been taken out of concrete buildings.
Yet unlike nearby Cancun, whose high-rise resorts are nearly all shut for repairs after their beaches were sucked away by Hurricane Wilma last month, many of Cozumel's hotels are open. Its best white sand beaches -- which are natural rather than
Hurricane Wilma Scrubs Mexico's MTV Awards
Hurricane Wilma Forces MTV to Postpone Latin American Music Awards; New Date Not Set
The approach of Hurricane Wilma has forced MTV to postpone its Latin American music video awards ceremony, which had been scheduled for Mexico's Playa del Carmen resort.
Dulce Gordillo, MTV's Mexico spokeswoman, confirmed the postponement and said a new date for the show hadn't been set.
The cable network had shifted the program from Thursday to Wednesday to avoid the hurricane, which was forecast to pass close by Mexico's Caribbean coast Friday.
More: abcnews.go.com
Hurricane Wilma heads for Gulf of Mexico
Hurricane Wilma strengthened in the Caribbean Tuesday and headed toward the Gulf of Mexico, where it seemed likely to spare battered U.S. oil and gas fields but threatened storm-weary Florida.
The rapidly intensifying storm also menaced Honduras and Nicaragua with up to 10 inches of rain, compounding the woes of Central America. More than 1,000 people in Guatemala and El Salvador were killed by landslides and floods triggered by Hurricane Stan this month.
Wilma was expected to strengthen into a major hurricane with winds of more than 110 mph by Thursday and its likely
Wilma pounds Mexico’s Yucatan
Hurricane Wilma pounded Mexico’s Caribbean coast on Saturday, destroying homes and flooding beach resorts as it meandered slowly over the Yucatan peninsula.
Winds of 120 miles an hour knocked over houses, uprooted trees and kept thousands of tourists in cramped shelters.
The storm has been downgraded to a Category 3 on the Saffir-Simpson scale— but its winds and rains were still powerful enough to cause massive damage and threaten lives. Emergency forces have reported no deaths so far.
The stalled storm has battered Playa del Carmen, Cancun and diving centre Cozumel for the past 36 hours and was
Wilma slams Mexico, threatens Florida
In the early afternoon on Friday, Oct. 21, 2005, Hurricane Wilma was moving slowly northwest with the eye 35 miles off the coast of Cozumel, Mexico on the Yucatan peninsula. The Category 4 hurricane is currently packing 145 mph winds with higher-speed gusts. Wilma is expected to turn northeast toward southern Florida while dropping as much as 40 inches of rain in parts of Cuba along the way.
With Wilma, the Atlantic Ocean's 21st named storm this year, the 2005 season has tied the record for the most named storms in a year. Pressure readings on
TUI cancels trips to Mexico due to Hurricane Wilma, 300 customers affected
TUI AG said it has cancelled all trips to Yucatan, Mexico, until Oct 25 on account of Hurricane Wilma, affecting 300 customers.
It said it will try to offer its customers alternative destinations.
The tour operator currently has around 1,000 guests in Mexico, who will be transported back to Germany as soon as weather conditions allow.
Source: forbes.com
Hurricane Wilma slams into mainland Mexico
Ocean waves surged over the narrow strip of land that holds Cancun's resort hotels as Hurricane Wilma slammed into Mexican mainland, where some 30,000 tourists huddled in hotels and shelters amid shrieking winds and shattering glass.
The eye of the category 3 storm, which had already killed 13 people, first slammed into Cozumel Island _ the worst-hit, and now cut off _ and then headed north-northwest onto the mainland near the beach town of Playa de Carmen, south of Cancun.
The howling winds caused severe damage in Playa de Carmen, flattening dozens of wood-and-tarpaper
Wilma may become hurricane, heads for Gulf of Mexico
Four of seven major weather models predict Tropical Storm Wilma, which could become a hurricane by Tuesday, will head for the Gulf Coast of Florida.
Earlier Monday morning, most of the models forecast the storm would crash into the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico or Belize later this week.
By late morning, most of the forecasts showed the storm would turn north toward western Cuba and Florida's Gulf Coast.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center still forecast the storm would graze the northeastern tip of the Yucatan and enter the Gulf of Mexico where it could
