Hurricane Beatriz lashes Mexico's tourist west coast

Hurricane Beatriz bore down Tuesday on Mexico's resort-studded western coast with crashing waves and heavy rains dampening early summer holiday plans for thousands of tourists. Beatriz was forecast to begin moving away from the Mexico coast later Tuesday, but the effects of the category one hurricane were already being felt in resort cities like Acapulco, where trees were uprooted and roads under water.
In the Guerrero mountains meanwhile, heavy rains set off avalanches, although there have been no reports so far of any deaths from the storm. At 1500 GMT, Beatriz was about 90 kilometers (55 miles) south-south-east of the beach resort city of Cabo Corrientes, packing maximum sustained winds of around 130 kilometers (80 miles) per hour.
The US National Hurricane Center in Miami announced a hurricane warning for Mexico's western coast from La Fortuna northward to Cabo Corrientes, as the storm advanced toward land at around 22 kilometers (14 miles) per hour. Hurricane force winds could be felt as far away as 35 kilometers (25 miles) from the center of the storm, the NHC said. Officials said flash floods and mudslides were possible, but said rains and winds would diminish later in the day as Beatriz veers away from the coast.
The storm struck during the start of Mexico's busy summer tourist season, affecting Pacific coast getaway destinations from Zihuatanejo to Cabo Corrientes. Beatriz is the second Pacific hurricane of what is expected to be a heavier than usual storm the season. The hurricane season, which runs from June through November, will likely bring 12 to 18 named tropical storms in the Atlantic zone, of which six to 10 could become hurricanes, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
NOAA forecasts an elevated hurricane threat this year to the United States and Caribbean nations, and predicts three to six major storms of Category three intensity or higher on the five-level Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale. Adrian, the first Pacific hurricane of the 2011 season, was downgraded to a tropical storm over a week ago.