Hurricane Dean hits Mexico

Hurricane Dean, now a dangerous Category 5 storm packing torrential rain and winds of 160mph, has hit Mexico's Caribbean coast.The eye of the storm reached land just north of Chetumal, near Mexico's border with Belize. But, it passed south of Cancun where around 5,500 British holidaymakers are staying.Thousands of tourists have already fled beaches along the Yucatan Peninsula and many were able to leave Mexico on flights organised by holiday companies in recent days.Federation of Tour Operators' spokesman Graham Lancaster said: "The UK tourists will get very strong winds and rain but there should not be any structural damage. Holiday companies sent empty planes to take people home."The majority of those that are still there are staying in their hotels, although some have been moved into hurricane shelters."Thankfully, the eye of the hurricane is to the south of Cancun and the tourists will get the equivalent of a tropical storm rather than anything worse. Tour reps are with their clients and hopefully all will be well."Dean has killed at least 12 people across the Caribbean and has picked up strength after passing Jamaica and the Cayman Islands with up to 20ins of rain and sea water as high as 18ft threatening Mexico,Earlier, Robbie Black, of Llanelli, South Wales, said he and his family were among 300 passengers stranded after their flight to Cardiff out of Cancun on Wednesday was cancelled.He went on: "It is very scary because none of us from the UK have any experience of hurricanes, least of all a category five," he said."Everybody is casting their minds back to the pictures they have of the devastation of Katrina in New Orleans."And Dahlia Castillo, owner of Tony's Inn & Beach Resort in Corozal, north of Belize City, said: "We have evacuated our guests, and we are putting up everything we can put up. Then we need to get ourselves somewhere safe, because we are right by the water."The only thing we've had like this before that I can remember was a tropical storm in 2001, and that brought in some water and did some damage - and that was only a tropical storm."Dean could also threaten Mexico's Bay of Campeche, where most of the country's oil production is concentrated.State oil company Pemex has evacuated workers from the region and some US companies have pulled workers off Gulf of Mexico platforms as a precautionary measure.On Monday, up to 5,000 British tourists were stranded on Jamaica as Dean passed, the island and the neighbouring Caymans were however spared the full force of the tempest.Dean is the first hurricane of what is expected to be an above-average 2007 Atlantic storm season.Nasa is preparing to bring space shuttle Endeavour, which has been on a mission to the International Space Station, back to Earth a day early just in case Mission Control in Houston has to close because of the storm.Category 5 hurricanes - the strongest possible on the Saffir-Simpson scale - are rare but there were four in 2005, including Katrina, which devastated New Orleans.© Independent Television News Limited 2007. All rights reserved.

ITN | August 21, 2007

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