Tuesday 21 August 2007

Dean calms down







Hurricane Dean crashed into the Caribbean coast of Mexico today as the strongest hurricane to hit land in the Atlantic region since 1988.
It hit ancient Mayan ruins and headed for modern oil installations.
The eye of the storm made land near a port popular with cruise liners and about 40 miles east-north-east of Chetumal and the Belize border, according to the US National Hurricane Centre.
Dean's path was a stroke of luck for Mexico; it skirted most of the major tourist resorts, making landfall in a sparsely populated coastline.
By 4pm Dean had weakened to a Category 2 storm with winds of 105mph as it charged across the Yucatan Peninsula at about 20 mph on course for the Bay of Campeche, where the state oil company shut down production on the offshore rigs that extract most of the nation's oil. Dean was expected to increase in force once over the warm water again.

Have a look at the Guardians excellent animation on hurricanes by following the link below


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