One death in Mexico due to Hurricane Rick (Roundup)

Oct 19, 2009, 19:20 GMT

Mexico City - Hurricane Rick, once a powerful category-five storm, had weakened Monday en route to Mexico's Baja California Peninsula, where it had already claimed one life.

A large wave caused by the storm carried a 38-year-old Mexican man out to sea on Sunday, authorities said Monday. The man had been standing with his family on the rocks by Los Cabos harbour, in San Jose del Cabo, municipal civil protection inspector Wenceslao Cesena told the German Press Agency dpa.

'The tide swept over them in the area by the breakwater in the harbour, a retaining wall made up by rocks that protects the boats. And although one speedboat went to their rescue, the man died,' Cesena said by telephone.

Rick continued to move over the Pacific on Monday, with its dangerous winds threatening the southern tip of Mexico's Baja California Peninsula.

Downgraded Monday to a category two on the five-level Saffir- Simpson hurricane scale, Rick had sustained winds of 165 kilometres per hour with higher gusts and was moving northwest at 13 kilometres per hour, the Miami-based National Hurricane Centre (NHC) said.

The hurricane was expected to start moving north-northeast Tuesday, and it was expected to pass close to the renowned tourist resort area of Los Cabos late Tuesday or early Wednesday. On Monday, it was located 550 kilometres south-southwest of Cabo San Lucas, the NHC said.

While experts did not think Rick would make landfall, it was expected to cause heavy rain and strong winds in southern Baja California.

Rick was expected to weaken further, but the NHC stressed that it was still expected to be a hurricane when it approached the southern tip of the peninsula.

The Mexican states of Sinaloa, Colima, Jalisco and Nayarit were also watching the hurricane's progress.

On Colima's beaches - on Mexico's western coast - strong waves of up to 4 metres pulled down palm trees and caused other damage over the weekend.

'We were inside the house because it was raining hard. We had never seen anything like that. Overnight the waves started to hit the house and the water came into the house,' resident Daniel Cabellos was quoted as saying by Mexican media.

'We had to get out, trying to salvage our things. But we couldn't, the sea took everything,' said Cabellos, who lives on a humble wooden house on the beach.

Rick is the seventh hurricane of the season in the Pacific, only one of which has made landfall. In late August, Hurricane Jimena caused flooding in the Baja California Peninsula.