by
Hurricane Patricia became the most powerful hurricane ever after growing “explosively” in the warm waters off Mexico, threatening disaster for the country’s southwestern coast.
The storm strengthened into an extremely dangerous Category 5 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 200 mph, the National Hurricane Center said. The storm was located about 145 miles southwest of Manzanillo, Mexico, as of 8 a.m. ET Friday.
The hurricane center said Patricia was continuing to intensify and could grow stronger still before making landfall on Friday as a Category 5 storm.
Roberto Ramirez de la Parra, Mexico’s Director of National Water Commission, said Friday that “we find ourselves before the most intense hurricane that has ever existed since we have a record, in the whole of the planet and the whole of history.”
The hurricane is “heading for potentially catastrophic landfall in southwestern Mexico later [Friday],” according to the hurricane center.
Patricia’s rapid growth Thursday was “a remarkable feat,” forecasters said, with only one other hurricane — Linda in 1997 — intensifying so quickly during the satellite era.
Patricia’s combination of 200 mph winds and an extremely low barometric pressure of 880 mb made it the strongest hurricane ever recorded, and Earth’s most powerful tropical cyclone of 2015.
“It seems incredible that even more strengthening could occur before landfall later today,” forecasters said in a statement.
The storm prompted a hurricane warning for parts of the Mexican coast, including the area around the town of San Blas, about 170 miles south of the tourist mecca of Mazatlán. A hurricane watch and a tropical storm watch were also in effect in the region.
The Mexican government issued a series of emergency declarations and preparedness recommendations late Thursday at the storm approached.