TULUM, Mexico (AP) — After leaving a trail of destruction across the eastern Caribbean and killing at least nine people, Hurricane Beryl strengthened back to a Category 3 storm late Thursday and was barreling over open water toward Mexico’s resort-rich Yucatan Peninsula.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Beryl, which was first designated a Category 5 hurricane in the Atlantic, now has winds of 115 mph (185 kph) after weakening on Thursday.
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador issued a statement saying Beryl could make a direct strike on Tulum, which is smaller than Cancun yet receives thousands of tourists and residents.
“It is advisable that people move to higher ground, shelters or the homes of friends or family,” López Obrador wrote. “Do not hesitate, material possessions can be replaced.”
“Now that the hurricane is moving away from the Cayman Islands, the biggest immediate threat is landfall on the Yucatan Peninsula,” said Jack Beven, senior hurricane specialist at the U.S. Hurricane Center.
The hurricane center said the storm’s center was about 135 miles (220 kilometers) east-southeast of Tulum, Mexico, and was moving west-northwest at 16 mph (about 26 kilometers per hour).
Hurricane Beryl was expected to bring heavy rainfall and strong winds to Mexico’s Caribbean coast, before crossing the Yucatán Peninsula and re-strengthening in the Gulf of Mexico to make a second strike on northeastern Mexico.
As strong winds blew across Tulum’s white-sand beaches on Thursday afternoon, four-wheel-drive vehicles with megaphones circled the sand, telling people to leave. Tourists snapped photos of the rising waves, but military personnel urged them to leave as Beryl headed toward a potential landfall around Tulum on Friday morning.
Over the past days, Beryl damaged or destroyed 95% of homes on two islands of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, overturned fishing boats in Barbados and tore away roofs in Jamaica, before moving over the Cayman Islands on Thursday morning.
Shelters were erected along Mexico’s popular Caribbean coast, some small coastal communities were evacuated and even sea turtle eggs threatened by storm surges were removed from beaches.
In Playa del Carmen, most businesses remained closed Thursday and some boarded up windows as tourists jogged and a few locals walked their dogs under sunny skies. In Tulum, authorities shut down everything and evacuated beachside hotels.
Francisco Bencomo, general manager of Hotel Umi in Tulum, said all his guests had left. “Under these circumstances, we will be in a complete lockdown,” he said, adding that there are no plans to bring guests back before July 10.
“We have cut off the gas and electricity. We also have an emergency floor where two maintenance workers will lock down,” he told the hotel. “We have told them to stay in the room farthest from the beach and the windows.”
“I hope the impact on the hotel is minimal, the storm passes Tulum quickly, and it’s nothing serious,” he said.
Tourists were also taking precautions. Lara Marsters, 54, a therapist visiting Tulum from Boise, Idaho, said, “This morning we got up and filled all of our empty water bottles with tap water and put them in the freezer … so we’d have water to flush the toilet.”
“We’re hoping the power goes out. We’re going to be safe and protected,” Marsters said.
“I thought we’d get some last rays of sun today,” said tourist Miriam Setra, 34, of Dallas, Texas, as she ate a sandwich on the beach Thursday. “And then we’d stay indoors and huddle until it’s over.”
But when Beryl re-emerges into the Gulf of Mexico a day later, forecasters say it will regain hurricane strength and could make landfall in Matamoros, near the Mexico-US border. The area was already soaked by Tropical Storm Alberto in June.
Velazquez said temporary storm shelters have been set up in schools and hotels, but efforts to evacuate some of the most vulnerable villages — such as Punta Allen, located on a narrow sliver of land south of Tulum — and Mahahual, further south — have been only partially successful.
Beryl left behind the worst of the damage. Its eyewall slammed into Jamaica’s southern coast on Wednesday afternoon, while telephone poles and trees were blocking roads in Kingston on Thursday morning.
Authorities have confirmed that a young man died on Wednesday when he was swept into a storm drain while trying to retrieve a ball. A woman also died when a house collapsed on top of her.
Residents took advantage of the rain stopping and started clearing the debris.
Sixty percent of the island was left without power, as well as water shortages and limited telecommunications. Government officials were assessing the damage, but were hampered by a lack of communications, primarily in the southern parishes that suffered the most damage.
About 1,432 people in Jamaica remain in shelters, like Desreen Campbell, who lives in a low-lying area of Old Harbour Bay, who cried, “My house is almost flooded!”
Nearby, Carlton Golding lamented, “This time I lost everything.” Golding’s home was completely destroyed by the storm, marking his second time suffering hurricane damage.
In the south-central parish of Clarendon, residents attempted to repair damaged roofs and remove fallen trees. Several roads in the area remained partially blocked by downed power and telecommunications poles.
Cayman Islands Prime Minister Juliana O’Connor on Thursday thanked residents and visitors for contributing to “collective calm” ahead of Beryl by following hurricane protocols.
Michelle Forbes, St. Vincent and the Grenadines director of the National Emergency Management Organisation, said about 95% of homes on Mayreau and Union Islands were damaged by Hurricane Beryl.
Three people were killed in Grenada and Carriacou, while another died in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, officials said. Three other deaths were reported in northern Venezuela, where four people remain missing, officials said.
One person died in Grenada when a tree fell on a home, Environment Minister Kerryn James told The Associated Press.
Also, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said Thursday that Tropical Storm Aletta formed in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Mexico. Aletta, which was about 190 miles (310 kilometers) from Manzanillo and had maximum sustained winds of 40 mph (65 kph), was forecast to move away from land and dissipate by the weekend.
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Myers reported from Kingston, Jamaica. Associated Press writers Renloy Trail in Kingston, Jamaica; Mark Stevenson, Maria Verza and Mariana Martinez Barba in Mexico City; Coral Murphy Marcos in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Lucanus Olivierre in Kingstown, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, contributed to this report.
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