Country braces for monster hurricane

Hurricane Patricia headed toward southwestern Mexico on Friday as a monster Category 5 storm that forecasters said could make a "potentially catastrophic landfall" later in the day.

Residents of a stretch of Mexico's Pacific Coast dotted with resorts and fishing villages on Thursday boarded up homes and bought supplies ahead of Patricia's arrival.

With maximum sustained winds near 325 km/h, Patricia is the strongest storm recorded in the eastern Pacific or in the Atlantic, said Dave Roberts, a hurricane specialist at the US National Hurricane Center.

Patricia's power was comparable to that of Typhoon Haiyan, which left more than 7,300 dead or missing in the Philippines two years ago, according to the UN's World Meteorological Organization. In Mexico, officials declared a state of emergency in dozens of cities. The governor of Colima ordered schools closed on Friday, when the storm was forecast to make what the Hurricane Center called a "potentially catastrophic landfall".

Rain pounded Manzanillo late on Thursday while people took last-minute measures a head of Patricia, which quickly grew from a tropical storm into a Category 5 hurricane, leaving authorities scrambling to make people safe.

At a Wal-Mart in Manzanillo, shoppers filled carts with non-perishables as a steady rain fell outside.

Veronica Cabrera, shopping with her young son, said Manzanillo tends to flood with many small streams overflowing their banks. She said she had taped her windows at home to prevent them from shattering.

Alejandra Rodriguez, shopping with her brother and mother, was buying 10 liters of milk, a large jug of water and items like tuna and canned ham that do not require refrigeration or cooking. The family already blocked the bottoms of the doors at their home to keep water from entering.

(China Daily 10/24/2015 page10)