Tropical
Storm Helene slams Mexico; Hurricane Gordon heads for Azores
Tropical
Storm Helene made landfall off the Gulf of Mexico on Saturday and
weakened into a tropical depression as it plowed up Mexico's east
coast, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
18
August, 2012
The
depression was about 65 miles west-northwest of Tampico and had
maximum sustained winds of 30 miles per hour, the NHC said in its 4
p.m. CDT bulletin.
Tropical
storm warnings were discontinued on the Mexican coast, although
Helene still was expected to produce two to four inches of rain in
the states of Veracruz and Tamaulipas.
Helene
was predicted to continue weakening and dissipate within 48 hours,
the NHC said.
There
were no reports that Helene had affected the Gulf of Mexico's oil
installations, which are built to resist much more powerful
hurricanes.
Earlier,
Portugal posted warnings for the central and eastern Azores islands
as Tropical Storm Gordon moved eastward across the Atlantic and later
turned into a hurricane.
The
National Hurricane Center said Gordon had maximum sustained winds of
75 mph and was headed east at 18 mph.
In
the northern part of Veracruz, a lush coastal state with hundreds of
towns and villages sitting along streams and rivers that can swell
dangerously in heavy rain many were evacuated as Ernesto approached
last week, and flood damage made some 10,000 people homeless.
State
of emergency
Mexico's
government declared a state of emergency in more than 100 population
centers in Veracruz and was providing them with emergency aid. The
country's national weather service warned of intense rains and winds
along the Veracruz and Tamaulipas coasts, with heavy rain, hail and
lightning possible.
A
storm surge could raise water levels by as much as 1 to 2 feet above
normal along the immediate coast and to the north of where landfall
is made.
Heavy
rain was expected in the city of Tampico, an oil-refining center and
important port in the southernmost part of Tamaulipas state. The
Tampico metropolitan area has roughly 790,000 inhabitants, sits just
above sea level and is surrounded by lakes and lagoons that are
already full and could easily flood in the event of heavy rains.
Civil
protection authorities in Veracruz issued a yellow alert, one level
below the highest warning, for population centers in the north and
center of the state, warning residents to familiarize themselves with
the locations of emergency shelters, avoid crossing swollen streams
and rivers, and keep listening to radio and TV for storm updates.
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