MEXICO: Residents in Nautla, Veracruz begin cleaning up after Hurricane Dean rips into Mexico's Gulf coast - its second landfall in Mexico

A large tree felled by the wind was blocking a road in the small town of Nautla after Hurricane Dean, packing winds of up to 100 mph (160 kph), made landfall in Mexico for the second time. Dean first hammered Mexico's Caribbean resort of Tulum and swallowed sand from the famous beach at Cancun on Tuesday (August 21) after killing 12 people in Haiti, Jamaica and other parts of the Caribbean. Nautla was on the receiving end of Dean's wrath on Wednesday, and while trees fell and rain blew into houses, damage was relatively minimal, according to many. Local residents in Nautla started the arduous clean-up process just hours after Dean swept through. One man chopped up a tree trunk to move it out of the way, while others swept water out of their homes. No one was reported dead from Dean's two-day rampage in Mexico despite howling winds that put it in the fiercest Category 5 level of hurricanes. It weakened to a tropical storm and was not expected to threaten the U.S. coastline. Although Nautla was not destroyed by the storm, there was some damage. This house was torn apart by the hurricane. It's lamina roof was ripped off and everything was soaked by the strong rain, including a mattress. A local resident, Delfina Vazquez, explained how frightened she felt. Her family and her had to eventually get out of the house for fear that it would collapse. "In fact, I was very scared. I didn't want to leave my house, because I didn't want to loose my belongings, I didn't want them to get wet. I didn't want to leave. But I have a girl who suffers from down syndrome. My husband told me to get out, otherwise the roof would've fallen on our heads," she said. The state government of Veracruz warned of heavy rains, which often cause mudslides in poor mountain villages after hurricanes pass. Dean had pounded Mayan villages and beach resorts in a run across the Yucatan Peninsula on Tuesday and then passed through the Campeche Sound where the vast majority of Mexico's crude for export to the United States is produced. Victims still remain in shelters set up by the government. They have been given, food, water and a roof over their heads. They will remain here until it is safe to go home. "The hurricane brought me here," a little girl called Katia told Reuters. Oil monopoly Pemex said oil production, 80 percent of which was cut due to the storm, would begin to return to normal as of Friday (August 24). Dean was the first hurricane in the Atlantic basin to strike land as a Category 5 since Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Mexico does not expect Dean to cause substantial damage or hurt production of coffee and sugar crops in Veracruz state, a spokesman for the agriculture ministry said.

ITN Source | August 23, 2007

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