CABO SAN LUCAS, Mexico (AP) — Tropical Storm Enrique, which spent the weekend as the first hurricane of the eastern Pacific season, kept losing steam Tuesday as it headed for the resorts at the southern end of Mexico’s Baja California Peninsula.
Authorities closed the ports of Cabo San Lucas and San Jose del Cabo to smaller boats, as well the ports of Los Barriles and La Paz. City officials in Los Cabos were reviewing potential shelter locations that could be used in case of flooding. Forecasters expected 1 to 2 inches of rain in Baja California Sur state, with localized amounts of as much as 4 inches.
Baja California Sur Gov. Carlos Mendoza Davis said the state was ready for the storm.
Enrique passed by the Cabo Corrientes bulge on Mexico’s southwestern coast Sunday night, and then began weakening Monday as it moved over the open sea.
The storm’s maximum sustained winds were down to 40 mph (65 kph) Tuesday, just barely a tropical storm, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
Further weakening was forecast over the next few days, and “the center of Enrique was expected to move near or over portions of the southern Baja California Peninsula” late Tuesday or early Wednesday, the center said.
At midafternoon Tuesday, the storm’s core was about 105 miles (165 kilometers) east-southeast of Cabo San Lucas at the southern tip of Baja and moving northwest at 9 mph (15 kph).
Heavy rains were creating hazardous conditions along Mexico’s Pacific coast.
Early Tuesday, a Jalisco state civil defense team rescued a trucker from swift floodwaters of the El Organito stream in Cihuatlan township near the border with Colima. The driver waited on the hood of his tractor trailer until rescuers could get a life jacket and rope to him. He leapt into the water and was pulled to safety.
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