Hurricane Beryl slammed into Mexico’s coast near top beach destinations on Friday, uprooting palm trees with strong winds and dumping heavy rain, after leaving a deadly path of destruction across much of the Caribbean.
The hurricane’s center moved over the Yucatán Peninsula, where maximum sustained winds dropped slightly to about 100 mph (161 kph) as it reached the coastal resort city of Tulum.
While the center of the storm moved across Tulum, slowing winds and knocking down some tree branches, the U.S. National Hurricane Center predicted dangerous storm surges and damaging waves in the surrounding area.
The state governor urged residents to stay home.
“We ask everyone to stay in their homes, in their shelters, and not to leave,” Quintana Roo Governor Mara Lizama said in a video message on the social media platform X.
Yucatan is among the top tourist destinations in Mexico, known for its white sand beaches, lush landscapes and Mayan ruins.
Beryl, now a Category 2 hurricane, is the first hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic season. This week it became the oldest Category 5 hurricane on record, with scientists suggesting its rapid strengthening is likely due to human-caused climate change.
Mexico’s civil protection agency has issued a red alert, indicating the most severe threat.
A video posted on social media on Friday showed strong winds hitting downtown Tulum.
Schools were closed in Quintana Roo state and the Mexican Defense Ministry opened about 120 storm shelters in anticipation of Hurricane Beryl’s arrival.
Before reaching Mexico, Hurricane Beryl wreaked havoc across several Caribbean islands. It swept through Jamaica, Grenada, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines, as well as dumping heavy rains on northern Venezuela. It killed at least 11 people, destroyed buildings, and downed power lines and trees.
The death toll is likely to rise as more information becomes available.
Beryl is expected to weaken rapidly as it crosses the Yucatan Peninsula, then regain strength as it re-emerges in the Gulf of Mexico. The National Hurricane Center expects the storm to move toward northeastern Mexico and southern Texas late in the week.
Hurricane Beryl forced about 3,000 tourists to evacuate from Isla Mujeres, a popular tourist island near Mexico’s popular beach resort of Cancun, said Jose Magana, tourism director for the island. Many residents took shelter in shelters in anticipation of the storm’s impact.
About 100 flights had been canceled at Cancun’s main airport by Thursday, sending tourists scrambling to catch the last departing flights.
Major oil platforms in Mexico, located mainly on the southern edge of the Gulf of Mexico, are not expected to be affected or shut down, but oil projects in U.S. waters to the north could be affected if the hurricane continues on its projected path.
A study by the Climameter Consortium found that climate change significantly intensified Hurricane Beryl. According to the study, the storm’s intensity, along with its associated rainfall and wind speed, increased by 10-30% as a direct result of climate change.
—Jose de Jesus Cortes, Raquel Cunha, and Paula Chiomanti.
Raul Cortes Fernandez, Cassandra Garrison, Brendan O’Boyle, Robertson Henry, Natalia Sieniawski and Brijesh Patel contributed to this report.
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