Damaging winds were spreading along with heavy rainfall leading to flash flooding, the Hurricane Center wrote in an update. It warned of “extremely destructive winds near the core during the next few hours” and mudslides in higher terrain.
“A nightmare scenario is unfolding for southern Mexico,” it said earlier as Otis barreled toward the city of about a million people.
Otis’s peak winds leaped 90 mph in 12 hours Tuesday, the fastest intensification observed in the northeastern Pacific since satellite-monitoring of hurricanes began in 1966, according to Phil Klotzbach, a hurricane researcher at Colorado State University. Tuesday morning, Otis was a tropical storm with top winds of 70 mph. By the time it made landfall shortly after midnight Wednesday local time, it was a Category 5 hurricane with wind speeds that had more than doubled.
The hurricane was expected to dissipate over southern Mexico by nightfall, the Hurricane Center said. As Otis barrels ashore, the Hurricane Center said it would produce “catastrophic damage” near its center, both from a “life-threatening” storm surge, or sudden rise in sea level, and from devastating winds that could produce tornado-like damage.
The storm’s torrential rain was forecast to produce widespread totals of 8 to 16 inches, and localized amounts up to 20 inches through Friday.
Scientists say extreme intensification of storms like Otis, fueled by abnormally warm ocean waters, is made much more probable because of human-caused climate change. Just this week, a study described increases in rapid intensification in Atlantic storms in the past several decades.
“The increased likelihood for hurricanes to transition from weak storms into major hurricanes in 24 hours or less was particularly striking,” Andra Garner, the study’s author, told The Washington Post.
Hurricane warnings stretch from Punta Maldonado northward to Zihuatanejo along the southern portion of Mexico’s west coast in the state of Guerrero; this warning zone includes Acapulco. The area has no experience with a hurricane as strong as Otis and has only been affected by substantially weaker storms since records have been kept.
“There are no hurricanes on record even close to this intensity for this part of Mexico,” according to the Hurricane Center.
This is uncharted territory for #Acapulco with a Major Hurricane approaching. The last hurricane to approach from the south like #Otis was an unnamed Category 1 in 1951. No Major Hurricane has threatened this region in recorded history. Pauline ’97 the winds were blowing offshore pic.twitter.com/EK6q3QveHw
— Bill Karins 💧 (@BillKarins) October 24, 2023
Storms that intensify as rapidly as Otis are most difficult to prepare for as they leave little time for governments to warn residents and for emergency management to mobilize resources.
A Guerrero news outlet reported early Wednesday that intense rains and winds were causing flooding on the coast of Acapulco and had destroyed the facade of a large mall.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said Tuesday night on social media that disaster planning was underway, and he encouraged people to move to shelters and to stay away from rivers, streams and ravines.
The state of Guerrero is working closely with the armed forces and the Acapulco government to “redouble efforts” to strengthen “surveillance, prevention and assistance to the population,” state governor Evelyn Salgado Pineda said in a post on Facebook.
Abelina López Rodríguez, mayor of Acapulco, said on Facebook that 25 temporary shelters have opened across the city for those whose homes are at risk.
Meteorologists often describe poorly predicted, rapidly intensifying storms like Otis as a worst-case scenario, especially when immediately leading up to landfall.
On X, formerly Twitter, meteorologists said they were shocked by Otis’s sudden strengthening, which computer models failed to predict.
“Just a catastrophic failure of modeling with this one. Leads to a poor forecast outcome in the worst possible way for the Acapulco area,” posted Matt Lanza, who operates the Eyewall, a website for hurricane commentary.
This is wild. Models didn’t have #Otis a hurricane 24 hours ago, now it’s expected to be a Category 5 near landfall tomorrow. That’s Mother Nature for you. https://t.co/UFrpio0e5Y
— Matt Devitt (@MattDevittWX) October 25, 2023
Although forecasts of hurricane strength have improved markedly in recent years, the prediction of rapid intensification remains a major challenge — especially for compact storms like Otis, which are more prone to sudden changes in their environment.
Otis has drawn comparison to Patricia in 2015, which also underwent extreme rapid intensification off Mexico’s west coast and became the most intense hurricane on record in the northeast Pacific. However, that storm weakened some before landfall.
Otis is set to become the fourth tropical storm or hurricane to strike Mexico’s west coast this month, following Lidia, Max and Norma.
Ellen Francis contributed to this report.
