CHARLOTTE – Hurricane Patricia made landfall in Mexico Friday night as a dangerous Category 5 storm.
It morphed into the strongest hurricane on record – with sustained winds of 200 miles per hour — in just 24 hours, and meteorologists predicted it would pass over resort communities on the West Coast, where many Americans — and North Carolinians — rode out the storm.
“To be honest with you, I worried about my daughter, she is 18 months — I’m going to try not to get emotional. Just, what’s going to happen? Am I going to get to see her again?” Raleigh resident Heather Vaughan told Time Warner Cable News by phone Friday.
Vaughan and her husband were celebrating their 12th wedding anniversary at the Four Seasons resort in Punta Mita, Mexico, where resort officials required the nearly 500 guests to stay in a ballroom.
“They’ve got water for us and tons of food, and we have blankets — they’ve given us duvet comforters and pillows,” she said.
Mexico’s tourism secretary says about half of the people staying at hotels left ahead of the storm, as crews from North Carolina prepare to respond.
“Our expectation is that shelter’s going to be a big need, that clean water will be a big need, likely food will be a big need,” Ken Isaacs with Samaritan’s Purse said.
The Boone-based organization was readying its response team Friday night, anticipating being on the ground in the hardest hit areas in Mexico for two to four months, as soon as they can get there, Isaacs said.
“We need to see the path that the storm chose. We need to get permission and coordinate well with the government of Mexico,” he said.
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