Hurricane Agatha kills 11 in south Mexico

SAN ISIDRO DEL PALMAR－Hurricane Agatha caused flooding and mudslides that killed at least 11 people and left 20 missing, said the governor of the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca on Tuesday.

Governor Alejandro Murat said rivers overflowed the banks and swept away people in homes, while other victims were buried under mud and rocks.

There were fundamentally two reasons for the deaths, Murat told local media.

"There were rivers that overflowed, and on the other hand, and the most serious part, were landslides," he said.

Murat said the deaths appeared to be concentrated in a number of small towns in the mountains, just inland from the coast. But he said there were also reports of three children missing near the Huatulco resort.

Agatha formed on Sunday and quickly gained power. It made history as the strongest hurricane on record to make landfall in May in the eastern Pacific, said Jeff Masters, a meteorologist with Yale Climate Connections and the founder of Weather Underground.

It made landfall on Monday afternoon on a sparsely populated stretch of small beach towns and fishing villages in Oaxaca.

It was a strong Category 2 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 169 kilometers per hour, but it quickly lost power moving inland over the mountainous interior. Remnants of Agatha were moving northeast on Tuesday into Veracruz State.

Power restored

Murat said power had been restored to some communities near the coast, but some bridges had been washed out and mudslides blocked a number of highways.

San Isidro del Palmar, which is not far from the coast, was swamped by the Tonameca river that flows through the town.

Residents waded through neck-deep water to salvage what items they could from their homes, walking gingerly with piles of clothing atop their heads and religious figures in their arms.

Argeo Aquino, who has lived in the town his whole life, said he could recall only two other occasions when he saw such flooding.

"The houses are totally flooded, so they are getting everything out," Aquino said on Monday as he watched his neighbors.

"There are stores, houses. More than anything else, we have to try to save all the good material, because everything else is going to be washed away."

Tonameca's brown waters reached the windows of parked cars used for local transportation.

Nearby, heavy rain and high winds lashed the beach town of Zipolite, known for its clothing-optional beach and bohemian vibe. The wind howled for about six hours on Monday, said Silvia Ranfagni, manager of the Casa Kalmar hotel in Zipolite.

"The sound of the wind was really loud, high-pitched. It started at 1 pm when the telephone coverage went out and it didn't calm down until 7:30," Ranfagni said.

"A lot of trees were down, roads washed out. A lot of metal and thatched roofs were blown off."

Agencies via Xinhua