Hurricane Jimena hits Mexico

LOS CABOS, Mexico - Hurricane Jimena plowed over Baja California yesterday, tearing off roofs, knocking down power poles and bringing welcome rainfall to a drought-stricken state.

The storm made landfall yesterday afternoon between Puerto San Andresito and San Juanico, a sparsely populated area of fishing villages on the Pacific coast of the peninsula.

Wind gusts and heavy rains blew down dozens of trees and lamp posts in Loreto, the nearest significant resort town to the area where Jimena made landfall, according to Humberto Carmona, a city official manning an emergency response center. About 500 people were in shelters in Loreto, which lies roughly on the other side of the narrow peninsula from where Jimena made landfall.

The federal government said that more than 11,000 people went to shelters in the peninsula.

The picturesque beach resorts of Los Cabos, on the southernmost tip, were mostly spared overnight, when the roaring hurricane toppled signs, choked streets with mud and knocked out power, but did little serious damage. No injuries were reported.

Winds fell from Tuesday's roaring 150 mph Category 4 blasts to 80 mph, making Jimena a Category 1 storm. The U.S. National Hurricane Center said that it was expected to weaken further as it runs north up the Baja peninsula, which is home to about 3.5 million people, including more than 150,000 U.S. citizens, according to the U.S. State Department. Jimena was located about 40 miles south of Santa Rosalita, and moving north near 12 mph.

Winds damaged some homes in the small farming city of Ciudad Constitucion, Baja California Sur Gov. Narciso Agundez told the Cabo Mil radio station.

In Los Cabos, Ariel Rivero, 49, a fishing-boat captain who grew up in Long Beach, Calif., and moved here 30 years ago, surveyed the marina where his boat, the Great Escape, was undamaged.

"We really lucked out," Rivero said. "If it had hit Cabo head on, this place would have been a disaster," he said of the hundreds of tightly packed boats, some worth millions, and the surrounding resort hotels now basking in the calm.

"Everyone is kind of breathing a sigh of relief," said Shari Bondy, who rents homes and runs a campground with her family in the remote coastal fishing village of Bahia Asuncion, halfway up the peninsula from Los Cabos.