Stranded LA Traveler Anxious During ‘Calm Before the Storm' in Mexico

Rosy Cordero, of Los Angeles, was one of several travelers stranded in her Marriott Puerto Vallarta hotel as Hurricane Patricia neared the coast

A potentially devastating hurricane building in the Pacific threatened Mexico's coast with maximum sustained winds near 200 mph, forcing an airport closure and stranding travelers in resort towns along the region's coast.

Several flights from Southern California to parts of Mexico in the path of Hurricane Patricia were canceled Friday as the region prepared for powerful winds. Puerto Vallarta's international airport will close Friday as the Category 5 storm lumbers over the ocean.

[NATL-LA] Hurricane Patricia Looms Over Mexico

Rosy Cordero, of Los Angeles, was one of several travelers stranded in her Marriott Puerto Vallarta hotel. The freelance journalist is on her first travel review trip to the resort town, about 500 miles west of Mexico City.

"I stand on my balcony and the water's right there, the beach is right there," said Cordero. "I'm probably not in the best place, right now."

Trip organizers were attempting to bus Cordero and colleagues to Guadalajara, about 180 miles east, for another flight, Cordero said. The hurricane is expected to make landfall in southwestern Mexico Friday afternoon.

"It's really the calm before the storm, right now," Cordero said Friday morning. "It's just the winds, minimal rain. I'm really just trying to be as calm as possible. I'm really anxious."

Conditions were breezy when she arrived Wednesday, Cordero said.

Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio told Mexico's Radio Formula Friday morning that officials are especially worried about the safety of people in the tourist resort of Puerto Vallarta and in the nearby community of Bahia de Banderas, in Nayarit state.

"We need people to understand the magnitude of the hurricane," Osario said. "It is a devastating hurricane, the biggest one ever registered."

The Associated Press reported that the lobby of the Sheraton Hotel in Puerto Vallarta is bustling, with a long line of people forming to check out. More than 900 guests had rooms at the hotel the previous evening, but many wanted to get out of town before the storm arrived.

The U.S. State Department estimates there a upward of tens of thousands United States citizens in the area of the storm.

"It's going to maintain strength and a Category 5," said NBC4 forecaster Crystal Egger. "If we're lucky, it will downgrade to a 4."

The director of Mexico's National Water Commission said Hurricane Patricia is powerful enough to lift automobiles and destroy homes that are not sturdily built with cement and steel. Director Roberto Ramirez said people in the most danger from the hurricane will be those on the coast, especially in the state of Jalisco.

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The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Patricia is the strongest hurricane ever recorded in the Western Hemisphere. Dave Roberts, a hurricane specialist at the Hurricane Center, said Friday morning that the storm is the strongest one they've seen in the eastern Pacific or in the Atlantic with maximum sustained winds near 200 mph

Patricia is centered about 145 miles southwest of the Pacific resort of Manzanillo and about 215 miles south of Cabo Corrientes. The system is packing comparable force to that of Typhoon Haiyan, which left more than 7,300 dead or missing in the Philippines two years ago.

Signs at LAX Friday morning showed two cancellations, one for United and one for Delta. Ten Alaska Airlines flights to and from Puerto Vallarta also were canceled, including two LAX flights and two John Wayne Airport flights.

A look at Hurricane Patricia’s path as it nears Mexico. Shanna Mendiola has the forecast for Friday Oct. 23, 2015.
Copyright AP - Associated Press
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