Huge firework blast rattles Mexican
A chain of explosions ripped through a sprawling market selling fireworks for Mexico’s independence celebrations on Thursday, sending a huge column of smoke sky-high but causing only a handful of serious injuries.
Hundreds of blasts lasting for two hours reduced the market in the town of Tultepec, north-west of Mexico City, to a charred ruin. A large-scale tragedy was avoided only because stall owners ran for their lives as the explosions began.
Huddled with her children on the edge of a smoldering mass of twisted metal and smoldering wood the size of a football pitch and reeking of sulfur, Blanca Ramirez described fleeing her stall in the middle of the market as the blasts began.
“I told my son “Let’s get out of here,’” she said. “I started running and there was a massive boom.”
“It just got bigger and bigger, fireworks, fireworks,” sobbed a man interviewed on the radio who also escaped the carnage.
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Blast Destroys Mexico Fireworks Market
Fire, Explosions Destroy Mexico's Top Fireworks Market Just Before Independence Day
A fire engulfed Mexico's most famous fireworks market Thursday, setting off a chain of explosions in a town northeast of the nation's capital that destroyed hundreds of open-air stands just ahead of Independence Day celebrations.
There were no reports of deaths and only three serious injuries reported by late afternoon, Mexico State Civil Defense Director Roberto Vazquez told The Associated Press.
He said hundreds were treated for cuts and bruises or shock after the explosions at the marketplace in Tultepec, a few miles from Mexico City.
elipe
Firework factory explosion kills 5 in Mexico
An explosion at a fireworks factory in southern Mexico killed at least five people on Tuesday, an emergency services official said.
The civil protection agency said the factory in the town of Magdalena Apasco in Oaxaca state did not have a license to manufacture fireworks.
"Five people died there, all of them burned in the explosion," the official told Reuters by telephone.
Last week, three people were killed in a similar accident at another unlicensed fireworks plant in Oaxaca state.
Firework accidents are common, as Mexico produces masses of cheap pyrotechnics for Christmas and year-end festivities, as well
All declared dead in Mexican mine blast
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The 65 miners trapped inside a northern Mexico mine on Feb. 19 died instantly when an explosion elevated temperatures to more than 600 degrees Celsius (1,112 Fahrenheit), El Universal reported, citing Labor Minister Francisco Javier Salazar.
Salazar said yesterday in San Juan de Sabinas, Mexico, that the government will investigate the cause of the accident and the mine will stay closed for now, Universal reported. The mine is owned by Grupo Mexico SA.
The government had suspended rescue attempts on Feb. 24 because of dangerously high levels of lethal gas
Mexico mine rescue faces new obstacles on 5th day
A struggling operation to save 65 Mexican miners trapped in a coal mine faced new obstacles on Thursday as underground air quality and digging conditions worsened.
Rescuers came across piles of rubble from collapsed roofs where two of the men were working when a huge gas explosion ripped through the Pasta de Conchos mine on Sunday.
Since the collapse there has been no contact with the miners, who only had six hours' worth of oxygen with them and no food.
Relatives were hanging on the hope that they may be still be alive thanks to
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
Cicero lawmaker's hat in Mexico race
If state Sen. Martin Sandoval succeeds in his next election Saturday, he will serve in Mexico City as well as Springfield.
Sandoval is running for a seat on an advisory council created by Mexico President Vicente Fox in 2002 to incorporate Mexicans living in the United States into his government's policymaking.
Sandoval would be the first elected official in the U.S. to serve on the advisory council. That raises the peculiar prospect of the Cicero Democrat offering policy advice in an official capacity to Mexican Cabinet members while creating laws in Illinois.
The possibility has some observers praising
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
Zócalo
The Zócalo, once the site of ceremonies and celebrations in Gran Tenochitlán, is now the site of symbols of national power, as well as being the main area for public demonstrations, and popular celebrations.
In this area there is also the Catedral Metropolitana, a perfect example of colonial architecture, with its baroque and neo-classical façade, five naves and an invaluable collection of paintings. Next to the cathedral, we come to the Palacio Nacional, with its beautiful patios and murals by Diego Rivera on its walls, where episodes of Mexican History are so exquisitely portrayed.In the middle of the city’s historic
Huge '85 Earthquake Jolted Mexico Into Preparedness
Scientists who took high-tech data readings on the temblor reflect on the experience, the damage and the reforms stemming from them.
Twenty years ago, American seismologist John G. Anderson bet that the west coast of Mexico was due for a catastrophic earthquake.
He and colleagues used money from a National Science Foundation grant to buy 30 seismic monitors and install them in the states of Guerrero and Michoacan, aiming to be the first to digitally record a great quake.
Most of the monitors were in place on the morning of Sept. 19, 1985, when strong-motion sensors
