Tourist hotspot impacted: Category 5 Hurricane Otis hits Mexico

Hurricane Otis made landfall along southern Mexico's Pacific Coast as a Category 5 Hurricane overnight with winds gusting up to 200 mph. Widespread devastation is possible.

Otis rapidly intensified as the system approached the Pacific coastline of Mexico overnight before making landfall near the popular tourist destination of Acapulco around 1:25 a.m. CDT.

Alongside sustained winds of 165 mph and torrential rainfall, with some areas already recording more than 25 inches of rainfall, storm surge on the coast also contribute to severe coastal flooding.

After making landfall, Otis has weakened and will due so today. Before reaching the coast, the strong winds caused widespread power outages in Acapulco, knocking out street lights, casting the city into darkness.

Footage online shows significant damage to properties amid the hurricane-force winds. Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has asked those in the state of Guerrero to keep away from bodies of water and seek shelter in emergency accommodations.

Before arriving in Mexico, Hurricane Otis saw its sustained winds speed increase by 80 mph in just 12 hours, from 65 mph to 145 mph. This is the fastest rise ever recorded in the region since 1966.

This extreme intensification was likely exacerbated by the presence of the El Niño phenomenon in the eastern Pacific, characterized by the presence of abnormally warm waters at the surface.

Thanks to Mexico’s mountainous terrain, Otis is expected to continue to weaken now it is on land and should dissipate completely by Wednesday evening.

However, that same mountainous terrain means that even as the system weakens, the risk of mudslides and flooding remains.

Military personnel have been deployed to aid those impacted by the system, as locals await daybreak to understand the full scale of the damage inflicted.

You can keep an eye on Hurricane Otis yourself on the WindRadar.