CARLOTTA MAKES LANDFALL IN MEXICO

Bertha Ramos, AAPJune 16, 2012, 2:26 pm

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Hurricane Carlotta has slammed into Mexico's resort-studded Pacific coast, toppling trees and lashing hotels while authorities evacuated people from low-lying areas.

The rapidly changing hurricane made landfall late on Friday as a Category 1 storm near Puerto Escondido, a laid-back port popular with surfers, and is expected to push inland and northward in the direction of Acapulco.

"The wind is incredible and the trees are swaying so much. A window just shattered," said Ernesto Lopez, a 25-year-old engineer who was visiting Puerto Escondido in Oaxaca state for a graduation.

Oaxaca's civil protection service said a highway leading to the resorts of Huatulco and Pochutla was partially blocked by mudslides and that authorities had opened emergency shelters and evacuated dozens of families from low-lying areas.

Rain was also falling in Acapulco in neighbouring Guerrero state, but authorities lifted the hurricane warning for the famed Pacific resort late Friday night and lowered it to a tropical storm warning.

Carlotta had strengthened into a powerful Category 2 hurricane earlier on Friday and forecasters had expected it to move northward, parallel to the coastline, possibly reaching Acapulco as a hurricane. But instead it moved inland and weakened. Forecasters now expect Carlotta to become a tropical storm on Saturday and a tropical depression by Sunday.

By late Friday night, Carlotta's winds had lessened to 150 kph, according to the US National Hurricane Centre in Miami. The centre of the storm was about 15 km northwest of Puerto Escondido and it was moving to the northwest at about 17 kph.

However, Ines Vos, who spent about a week without electricity after Pauline in 1997, said people appeared to be slow to prepare for Carlotta.

"They are warning people, but I don't see anybody moving," Vos said.