San Jose Del Cabo: Tropical storm Polo barrelled nearer on Friday to the Mexican Pacific resort of Los Cabos where thousands of troops were restoring order following widespread chaos caused by Hurricane Odile at the start of the week.
Odile ploughed into the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula on Sunday as a category three hurricane, causing major damage to beach resorts and sparking widespread looting.
The US National Hurricane Centre said a tropical storm warning was in effect from Santa Fe to La Paz on the normally arid peninsula, adding that Polo could dump rains from Jalisco state to the southern port of Baja California.
At around 2100 GMT, Polo was moving north-west at 10km/h and is expected to veer further westward over the next 48 hours, when the storm should weaken, the NHC said.
“However, any deviation to the north of the track could bring stronger winds to the southern Baja California peninsula,” the Miami-based NHC said, referring to Polo, which was blowing maximum winds of 113km/h).
Odile caused the worst ever damage to Mexico’s electricity infrastructure, state power company CFE said on Friday. About 98 per cent of the state of Baja California Sur’s population suffered some power outage because of the hurricane, it said.
So far power had been restored to just over a third of the state, the CFE said in a statement.
As of Thursday, some 18,000 tourists had been airlifted out of the area. On Friday, the US embassy in Mexico City said most US citizens had left Los Cabos, adding that those who remained should easily find a flight.
By then, the Mexican government had sent in 8,000 troops and federal police to reinforce security after looters made off with everything from beer to bicycles and plasma TVs from supermarkets in San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas.
Both the Mexican and US governments are working to get stranded tourists out on special flights.
