Monster Storm Agatha Headed for Mexico Tourist Towns Johanna Chisholm - Yahoo News
go to original May 30, 2022

Hurricane Agatha is barrelling toward a stretch of Mexico’s tourist destinations on the southwest coast, where the Category 3 storm was expected to make landfall by Monday afternoon or evening.

The US National Hurricane Center said by late Sunday night, Agatha, the first named storm of the season, had maximum sustained winds of 110mph (177kph), which is just 1mph shy of getting docked as a Category 3 storm.

Meteorologists tracked its path towards Puerto Escondido and Puerto Angel, two coastal towns who boast white sandy beaches and buzzing nightlife scenes, making them heavily reliant on the tourism industry.

Mexico’s Oaxaca state was expecting to be hit by up to 16 inches of rain, with some parts of the region expecting to receive a maximum of 20 inches, a prediction that began to spark fears of possible mudslides and flash floods.

Deadly mudslides brought on by heavy rainfall is something that the North American country is all too familiar with. In 2010, a mudslide in central Mexico killed 11 people suddenly, while in 2016, the heavy rains brought on by a downgraded Hurricane Earl still triggered multiple mudslides in the states of Puebla and Veracruz, and reportedly killed at least 39 people.

Meteorologists were also predicting that when Agatha makes its way across the Bay of Campeche, a southern bight in the Gulf of Mexico, in the next few days, it has the possibility of regaining strength and redeveloping as the first hurricane to strike the Atlantic for the season.

Officials within Mexico by Sunday had already begun sounding the alarm for the hurricane’s potential devastation, issuing warnings for boats and citizens to stay indoors.

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