Hurricane Simon hits Category 4 with 155 mph winds as it nears Mexico's Pacific coast

Hurricane Simon strengthened into a Category 4 storm with 155 mph (250 km/h) winds late on Saturday and is pressing towards Mexico's west-central Pacific coast, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in its advisory at 9pm Central time (8am PKT Sunday). That is 2 mph short of Category 5. The eye was about 105 km south-south-west of Manzanillo, in Colima state, crawling north at 7 km/h, and the NHC said the northern eyewall was only about 30 nautical miles off the coast.

Hurricane Simon: the numbers

• Winds: 155 mph (250 km/h) sustained, higher in gusts. Category 5 starts at 157 mph.
• Pressure: 928 millibars, a sign of a very intense storm.
• Size: hurricane-force winds reach 35 km from the centre and tropical-storm-force winds 150 km. The core is compact, which means the worst damage will be concentrated where the eyewall comes ashore.
• Rain: 10 to 20 inches (250 to 500 mm) over parts of south-western Mexico, with isolated totals of up to 30 inches (about 760 mm) in Michoacan, Colima and Jalisco. The NHC warned of life-threatening flooding and mudslides, especially on steep ground.
• Storm surge: dangerous surge with large, destructive waves along the coast near and east of where the centre makes landfall.

Warnings and the track

A hurricane warning covers the coast from Punta San Telmo to El Roblito and the Islas Marias, and a tropical storm watch runs east of Punta San Telmo to Lazaro Cardenas. The NHC expects Simon to make landfall or skirt the coast on Sunday, local time, which is Sunday afternoon and evening in Pakistan (Mexico's Central time is 11 hours behind PKT).

Forecasters admit they are unsure exactly how much land it will hit. Their discussion says the models "remain inconsistent" on whether the centre goes ashore, but that "significant or catastrophic wind, surge, and rainfall appears likely" over parts of west-central Mexico either way. The forecast keeps Simon at 155 mph near the coast at 5pm PKT on Sunday, down to 115 mph by early Monday PKT and to tropical-storm strength by Monday evening, with rapid weakening once its core is over land.

What Mexico is doing

Jalisco state has suspended classes on Monday in 22 coastal municipalities and started moving dozens of people out of at-risk areas, CBS News reported with the AP. In Puerto Vallarta, a resort city popular with American and Canadian tourists, businesses were boarding up windows on Saturday, and the state asked the tourism industry to get workers and visitors into shelters or safe zones.

A busy week of storms

Simon is not the only storm around Mexico this month. Polo hit Mexico last week as a Category 2 hurricane before flooding parts of the south-western US, CBS reported, and the NHC's last advisory on Rachel on Saturday night called it post-tropical off the Baja California peninsula, with tropical storm conditions expected over parts of Baja. On the Atlantic side, Hurricane Isaias has killed at least four people in Florida and Alabama: our Isaias story has the latest on deaths and power cuts.

If you have family in western Mexico

• Follow Mexico's Civil Protection orders and the state governments of Jalisco, Colima and Michoacan, not social media forecasts.
• Expect flights to change: check with the airline before travelling to or from Manzanillo or Puerto Vallarta.
• Agree a check-in time before the storm arrives; power and mobile networks often fail for days in a storm this strong.

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