11 people have died and 33 more are missing from Oaxaca, Mexico after Hurricane Agatha brought deadly flooding and landslides to the southern state, Oaxaca Gov. Alejandro Murat said Wednesday.
Agatha — the strongest hurricane to hit Mexico’s Pacific coast in the month of May since record-keeping began in 1949 — made landfall as a category two hurricane Monday.
It slammed a stretch of small beach towns and fishing villages with maximum sustained winds of 105 mph and moved inland to Oaxaca’s mountain regions, where it lost much of its strength.
Agatha brought torrential rainfall that caused rivers to overflow and mountainsides to rapidly erode.
More than 40,000 people in the state were impacted by the storm, Murat said. Many have lost power or saw their homes destroyed.
Most of the 11 victims were either buried in landslides or drowned in flash floods they were swept away with.
As first responders continued to search for the missing and began recovery efforts, Mexican officials were watching another potential tropical storm threat.
Forecasters said a large area of thunderstorms along the Caribbean coast of the Yucatan Peninsula has a 70% chance of developing into a tropical depression in the next 48 hours.
