Hilary reduced to Category 2 hurricane as Mexico, California brace for 'catastrophic' impact

Hurricane Hilary made landfall on Mexico’s Baja California peninsula late Saturday as a reduced but still hazardous Category 2 hurricane, threatening the region with “catastrophic” floods and crossing into the southwestern United States as a tropical storm.

Meteorologists cautioned that, despite its lessening, the storm was still dangerous.

A car was swept away in an overflowing creek Saturday in the Mexican town of Santa Rosalia, on the peninsula’s eastern coast. According to Mulege township mayor Edith Aguilar Villavicencio, rescue teams were able to save four more victims.

It was unclear whether the fatality was connected to the hurricane, but footage uploaded by local officials showed torrents of water flowing through the town’s streets.

Forecasters said the storm, which brought flash floods, mudslides, isolated tornadoes, strong gusts, and extensive power outages, was still anticipated to go down in history as the first tropical storm to impact Southern California in 84 years.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency, and officials urged residents to complete their preparations by Saturday night. According to one expert, it will be too late by Sunday.

The storm is the most recent significant climatic calamity to wreak devastation on the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Maui, Hawaii’s largest island, is still hurting after a fire that killed over 100 people and destroyed the ancient town of Lahaina last week, making it the worst US inferno in more than a century. On Saturday, firefighters in Canada continued to battle blazes amid the country’s worst fire season on record.

On Saturday, Hurricane Hilary dumped torrential rain and floods to Mexico and the southwestern United States ahead of the storm’s planned border crossing on Sunday. Forecasters said it might rain up to 10 inches (25 centimetres) in southern California and southern Nevada, equivalent to a year’s worth of rain in certain locations.

“This does not lessen the threat, especially the flood threat,” Jamie Rhome, the US National Hurricane Center’s deputy director, said during a Saturday briefing to announce the storm’s downgraded status. “Don’t let the weakening trend and the intensity lower your guard.”

Meteorologists also expected the storm to churn up “life-threatening” surf and rip currents, including waves up to 40 feet (12 meters) high, along Mexico’s Pacific coast. Dozens sought refuge at storm shelters in the twin resorts of Los Cabos at the southern tip of the Baja peninsula, and firefighters rescued a family in San Jose del Cabo after the resort was hit by driving rain and wind.

In Tijuana, fire department head Rafael Carrillo voiced the fear at the back of everyone’s mind in the border city of 1.9 million people, particularly residents who live in homes on steep hillsides.

“If you hear noises, or the ground cracking, it is important for you to check it and get out as fast as possible, because the ground can weaken and your home could collapse,” Carrillo said.

Tijuana ordered all beaches closed Saturday and set up a half dozen storm shelters at sports complexes and government offices.

Mexico’s navy evacuated 850 people from islands off the Baja coast and deployed almost 3,000 troops for emergency operations. In La Paz, the picturesque capital of Baja California Sur state on the Sea of Cortez, police patrolled closed beaches to keep swimmers out of the whipped-up surf.

The US Hurricane Centre posted tropical storm and potential flood warnings for Southern California from the Pacific coast to interior mountains and deserts. The San Bernardino County sheriff issued evacuation warnings for several mountain and foothill communities ahead of the storm, while Orange County sent out its own alert for anyone living in a wildfire burn scar in the Santa Ana Mountains’ Silverado and Williams canyons.

An evacuation advisory for the tourist destination of Santa Catalina Island, 23 miles (37 kilometres) off the Southern California coast, urged residents and beachgoers to leave, while authorities in Los Angeles scrambled to get the homeless off the streets and into shelters.

Across the region, municipalities ran out of free sandbags and grocery shelves emptied out as residents stockpiled supplies. The US National Park Service closed California’s Joshua Tree National Park and Mojave National Preserve to keep visitors from becoming stranded amid flooding.

Major League Baseball rescheduled three Sunday games in Southern California, moving them to Saturday as part of split doubleheaders, and SpaceX delayed the launch of a satellite-carrying rocket from a base on California’s central coast until at least Monday.

The White House said President Joe Biden had been briefed on the latest preparedness plans ahead of the hurricane’s turn to the US. “I urge everyone, everyone in the path of this storm, to take precautions and listen to the guidance of state and local officials,” he said.

Hilary on Friday had rapidly grown into an exceedingly dangerous Category 4 major hurricane, with its top sustained winds peaking at 145 mph (230 kph). Its winds dropped to 115 mph (185 kph) early Saturday as a Category 3 storm, before further weakening to 100 mph (161 kph) as a Category 2.

By late afternoon Saturday, it was centred 600 miles (965 kilometres) south-southeast of San Diego, California. Moving north-northwest at 17 mph (28 kph), the storm was expected to turn more toward the north and pick up forward speed.

The hurricane was expected to brush past Punta Eugenia on the Pacific coast before making a nighttime landfall along a sparsely populated area of the peninsula about 200 miles (330 kilometres) south of the Pacific port city of Ensenada.