Riviera Maya Hurricane Damage Update

By Greg Benchwick
Special to the Mercury News

MAHAHUAL, Mexico - In the tiny beachside community of Mahahual, about 180 miles south of Cancún in what real estate developers are calling the Costa Maya, people are beginning to rebuild their lives.

Hurricane Dean bashed and slashed its way into town Aug. 21, taking with it the town's port - its largest source of revenue, which brought in up to three cruise ships per day - and nearly 80 percent of the buildings. At the height of the storm, much of Mahahual was underwater, and the day after many beachfront business owners had as much as three feet of sand in their buildings.

But this is hurricane alley. When a big brute like Dean rolls through, you wait out the storm and start rebuilding the very next day.

Government representatives say that rebuilding the port and the town's beachfront walkway is a priority. Some estimates say it will be rebuilt in the next six to eight months, but many locals believe it will take up to two years.

To the amazement of many, the vast majority of the Yucatán's tourist areas were not badly damaged by the ninth-largest Atlantic hurricane on record, which made landfall as a Category 5.

But the Riviera Maya and Costa Maya coasts are still as lovely as ever. Unlike Hurricane Wilma, which devoured much of Cancún's powdered-sugar sand, Dean left the beaches intact. There was a bit of wind scour along the coast from Playa del Carmen south through Tulum and down to the state capital of Chetumal, with refuse piling up on the beach from the wave surge.

Some Mexican newspapers reported minor damage to the reefs near Akumal and the Banco Chinchorro (just outside Mahahual), but divers in the area have not verified that.

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Ancient Cannons Discovered in Tulum

TULUM BEACH, Reuters - Hurricane Dean's rampage over Mexico's Caribbean coast last week unearthed three rusted 18th century cannons that had lain buried under a sandy beach for decades.

The cannons, around two yards long, were spotted poking through the sand on a beach near the arty resort of Tulum after Dean hit on August 21, Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History said on Wednesday.

Believed to be from a shipwrecked European galleon, the badly corroded cannons will be put back in to the sea to protect them from faster corrosion onshore and for scuba divers to enjoy, it said.

"People started working to clear up the beach and they found three artifacts that were uncovered when sand was torn away by the strong winds that hit the region," INAH's director in the region, Adriana Velazquez, said in a statement.

The cannons appeared close to the Hotel Mezzanine, just south of the clifftop Mayan ruins at Tulum, which INAH said were left intact by the Category 5 storm's 160 mph winds and lashing rains.

Lying on what is now a bar-lined tourist haven, the cannons were a flashback to the centuries following Spain's 1521 conquest of Mexico, when fleets of Spanish galleons loaded with gold, silver and other New World plunder crossed the Caribbean, often with English, French or Dutch pirates in pursuit.

The cannons are similar to others discovered in past years along Mexico's Caribbean coast and they appear to be more than 200 years old, Velazquez said.

Their bad state of corrosion suggests they were taken out of the sea many years ago and left out in the salty air, she said.

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Hurricane Dean: Playa Damage Reports

Playa del Carmen -- This beachfront tourist town has suffered only minor damages from the massive storm Hurricane Dean, which came ashore in the early morning hours about 100 miles south of town. Electricity has already been restored and many shops are opening back up for business. Even the ban on alcohol sales has been lifted -- a sure sign that things are slowly returning to normal.

The beaches and waterfront facilities suffered moderate damage. Many palm trees were uprooted and the facades and roofs of many buildings were blown apart. The tidal surge pushed sand half a block up from the beach in some areas.



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Riviera Maya Escapes the Worst of Dean

TULUM -- Hurricane Dean plowed into the Caribbean coast of Mexico Tuesday night as a Category 5 storm, with sustained winds of 160mph, making it the most intense Atlantic storm to make landfall in two decades, and the 9th strongest Atlantic storm in history. At post time, the storm had weakened to a Category 3 and is moving across the western side of the Yucatan.

The eye of the storm came ashore around 5:30am local time near the Majahual cruiseship port, which is about 40 miles north of the Mexico-Belize border and more than an hour south of Playa del Carmen. Fortunately, the area is sparsely populated and had largely been evacuated.
Dean was the first Category 5 hurricane to make landfall since Hurricane Andrew in 1992 in South Florida. Reports indicate the storm was intensifying right up until landfall, feeding off the Caribbean’s warm water temperatures.

The Cancun airport will be open for arrivals and departures as early as tomorrow and most hotels, restaurants and tourist centers will reopen within days.

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Hurricane Dean Aims South of Riviera Maya

Good news for the Riviera Maya this morning as the NOAA in the USA is forecasting Hurricane Dean to continue moving to the west and the west-northwest, sparing Playa del Carmen and the Riviera Maya from the brunt of the storm.

CNN is reporting hurricane-strength winds extending some 60 miles from the center of the storm and tropical storm-strength winds more than 150 miles from the center, so even though the area will not likely get a direct hit, it will still feel a major impact from the hurricane.

Several inches of rain are typical for areas to the north of a storm, which means that it is likely for the Riviera Maya to get a large amount of rain from the hurricane. The towns of Tulum, Punta Allen, Bacalar and Chetumal will likely feel more impact from the storm. Local authorities are urging extreme caution for this zone, though as of the morning, life seems to be going on as usual -- at least in Tulum, where people are still at the beach, going to restaurants and not appearing to worry too much about the coming hurricane.

Next update from the region on MayanHoliday.com will be this evening.

Hurricane Dean Threatens Riviera Maya

Local officials in Playa del Carmen and Cancun are urging tourists to leave the Yucatan Peninsula as quickly as possible to avoid the dangerous situations likely to come about with the passing of Hurricane Dean. The storm, currently a Category 4 but expected to grow into a 5, is forecast to strike the region by Tuesday.

The Cancun and Cozumel airports are still open, but could close as soon as Monday if the storm stays on its current path. Some flights into the region have been canceled and extra planes are being positioned in Cancun to help evacuate tourists whose return flights are not scheduled until after the storm is supposed to hit.

The editors of MayanHoliday.com urge all tourists to leave the area as quickly as possible, even if it means renting a car and driving inland, toward Mexico City. Even though emergency plans are in place to house tourists in safe areas away from the beach, resort towns are not good places to be during severe weather.

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Cozumel Diving Report

The San Antonio Express News published the following report, which describes the conditions of the Cozumel reef system one year after Hurricane Wilma.

"With frequent high winds and rough seas, the reefs are used to strong currents. Perhaps that's why there wasn't as much reef damage as one might expect from the hurricane, which wrecked so many man-made structures. The reefs have been subject to repeated blows from storms for thousands of years.

While Wilma cropped some sea fans and dislodged corals (especially in shallow waters), sea life has returned to normal, according to dive instructor and Akumal Dive Shop co-owner Pablo Diaz.

Our first dive was at the Palancar reef, in the waters near southwestern Cozumel. The ocean floor's wave action was strong, not surprising since dives in Cozumel are drift dives. The surf carries the divers with the current, while the boat follows along, meeting the divers when they pop up out of the water.

On the sea floor, though, we didn't notice any of the destruction of areas above. At the Palancar Caves, we dove down 80 feet, seeing turtles, schools of fish and a bat ray. We swam through small tunnels and gazed at colorful corals and sponges that survived the storm."

Read the complete story.

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