MEXICO CITY (AP) — Authorities in the Pacific coast resort of Acapulco were calling for help from anyone with a boat to help with water rescues as Tropical Storm John, which has caused a total of eight deaths in southern Mexico, dumped copious amounts of rain.
John, in its second incarnation, was lingering off the Pacific coast just short of a second landfall early Friday. It hit further east on the coast Monday as a Category 3 hurricane.
The flooding is so bad in Acapulco — which still hasn’t recovered from Hurricane Otis last October — that the head of the municipal civil defense agency said authorities were starting to use boats inside the city to rescue people from low-lying neighborhoods. Residents posted videos and photos of cars floating away in floodwaters, and people rescued from raging waters using life lines.
The city government called for anyone with a boat or personal watercraft to contribute them to rescue efforts in flooded neighborhoods. Gov. Evelyn Salgado said on X that tourism companies were starting to use personal watercraft and other small boats to rescue people in Acapulco.
“We are getting boats to start carrying out more effective evacuations,” Efrén Valdez, civil protection coordinator for Acapulco, told the Milenio Television station. “The situation is very complicated.”
Authorities reported they had performed an “important” number of water rescues Friday and that Acapulco’s airport remained closed.
The area had received a year’s worth of precipitation in a matter of days.
The rain was also setting off landslides and collapsing retention walls in the steep mountains above the city.
Officials have confirmed one boy was swept away by floodwaters in Acapulco and four others were killed in other parts of the coastal state of Guerrero, where Acapulco is located. Gov. Salomón Jara of the neighboring state of Oaxaca, said that three people had died there as a result of floods or mudslides related to John.
John was churning along the coast of Michoacan state early Friday about 55 miles (85 kilometers) west of the port Lazaro Cardenas, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center. It was moving north-northwest at 3 mph (6 kmh). The storm had maximum sustained winds of 60 mph (85 kph).
The Associated Press