Washington - Hurricane John's strong winds reached Mexico's Baja California Peninsula Friday afternoon, as forecasters predicted the eye of the storm would make landfall within hours.
The southern portion of the Baja peninsula was under a 'red alert' on a warning system for tropical storms and at least 21,000 people were evacuated from the region, while 10,000 tourists fled vacation destinations in the area.
At 2 pm (2100 GMT), the centre of the storm was located 95 kilometres east of the southern tip of the peninsula, and was moving north-northwest at about 13 kilometres per hour, the US National Hurricane Centre reported.
John, which had been classified as a category 3 storm earlier Friday, lost a little strength and was downgraded to a strong category 2 storm Friday afternoon.
Its winds were reaching speeds of 175 kilometres an hour and stronger gusts were possible. Winds of up to 140 kilometres could be felt as far as 35 kilometres from the centre of the storm.
Flash floods and mudslides were of major concern in the desert region, which contains many hills and dry river beds that are likely to fill with water from John's heavy rains.
Meanwhile, tropical depression Ernesto brought strong rain across the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. Up to 25 centimetres of rain were recorded by 4 pm (2000 GMT) in some areas of North Carolina and water filled streets in communities there and in Virginia.
About 400,000 people were without electricity across three states in the region, CNN reported, while one storm-related death occurred in North Carolina, state Governor Mike Easley said at a news conference earlier Friday.
Up to 15 more centimetres of rain were predicted for the region over the course of the storm.
© 2006 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
