Share

Tropical Storm Javier closes in on Baja California resorts

Overall, Tropical Storm Earl damaged about 2,000 homes and caused 15 small rivers in Veracruz to overflow their banks.

Advertisement

Mexican soldiers remove debris from the remains of a house flattend by a mudslide in Xaltepec, on the mountainous north of Puebla state, Mexico, Sunday, Aug. 7, 2016.

Before becoming a tropical storm as it moved across the region and then being downgraded to a tropical depression, the storm was Hurricane Earl.

A total of 28 people died in the communities of Tlaola and Huauchinango in the Mexican state of Puebla after their homes were buried by landslides following heavy rains from Earl, which reached Mexican territory on Thursday as a tropical storm and Saturday was only a remnant low pressure.

The governor of the Gulf Coast state of Veracruz, Javier Duarte, said Sunday that 11 people had died in landslides in the towns of Cocomatepec, Tequila and Huayacocotla.

Meanwhile, in the Pacific, a major storm has formed and is bearing toward Baja California Sur.

At least 25 of the deaths in Puebla state were confirmed on Sunday near the town of Huauchinango in the rugged Sierra Norte de Puebla mountains, site of the worst destruction so far.

The Miami-based National Hurricane Center said Javier was about 250 miles (405 km) southwest of Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

The storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 85 kilometres per hour with higher gusts and was expected to dump four to six inches of rain in western Mexico, it said.

“It is a tragedy what has happened to our people in Huauchinango”, Gabriel Alvarado, mayor of the township of Huauchinango, said in a statement issued before the full death toll had been determined.

The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) has warned of another storm approaching Mexico.

Advertisement

Share with Us – We’d love to hear eyewitness accounts, the history behind an article, and smart, constructive criticism.

Tropical Disturbance May Form in Gulf of Mexico