Tag Archives: Death

Major earthquake hits near Mexico City, dozens dead

People clear rubble after an earthquake hit Mexico City, Mexico September 19, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Jasso

By Anthony Esposito

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – A major earthquake of magnitude 7.1 struck central Mexico on Tuesday, toppling dozens of buildings in the heavily populated capital and killing at least 49 people nearby.

President Enrique Pena said 27 buildings had collapsed in Mexico City, one of the world’s biggest cities. The first reports of fatalities were from surrounding areas.

In the state of Morelos, just south of Mexico City, 42 people died, the state’s governor said. Authorities reported other deaths in neighboring Puebla and the State of Mexico.

“People are really scared right now,” said dentist Claudia Meneses who was in her clinic in Mexico City’s Lindavista neighborhood when the earthquake struck mid-afternoon. “We’re going to go to a building that fell to see if we can help.”

Earthquakes of magnitude 7 or above are regarded as major and are capable of causing widespread heavy damage.

Television images showed a multi-story building in the capital with a middle floor collapsed as sirens blared and first responders rushed to the scene. Other video showed the side of a government building shearing off and falling into the street as bystanders screamed.

Rescue workers pulled at least one survivor from a collapsed building in the Condesa neighborhood near the center of Mexico City.

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Twitter: “God bless the people of Mexico City. We are with you and will be there for you.” The city and its surrounding area are home to about 20 million people.

Damages are seen after an earthquake hit in Mexico City, Mexico September 19, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Jasso

Damages are seen after an earthquake hit in Mexico City, Mexico September 19, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Jasso

In Cuernavaca, a city south of Mexico City, there were unconfirmed reports on local radio of people trapped beneath collapsed buildings.

Mexican TV and social media showed cars crushed by debris. Many people fled into the streets, and electricity and phone lines were down in parts of the capital.

“We got out really fast, leaving everything as it was and just left,” said Rosaura Suarez, as she stood with a crowd on the street.

The quake hit only hours after many people participated in earthquake drills around the nation on the anniversary of a devastating quake that killed thousands in Mexico City in 1985.

Many people were also still shaken from another quake on Sept. 7 in southern Mexico that killed at least 98 people.

The epicenter of Tuesday’s quake was located in the central state of Puebla, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

(Reporting by Mexico City newsroom; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Alistair Bell)

Manslaughter charges possible in London tower block fire disaster: police

FILE PHOTO: A member of the emergency services works inside the Grenfell apartment tower block in North Kensington, London, Britain June 17, 2017. REUTERS/Hannah McKay/File Photo

By Estelle Shirbon

LONDON (Reuters) – The criminal investigation into the Grenfell Tower fire that killed about 80 people in London in June could result in manslaughter charges, but any prosecutions could be months away due to the complexity of the forensic work, police said.

The 24-storey social housing block, home to a poor, multi-ethnic community, was destroyed on June 14 by a fire that started in a fourth-floor flat in the middle of the night and rapidly engulfed the whole building.

Police have formally identified 60 of the victims, but painstaking forensic work to find human remains, some of them tiny fragments, among tonnes of debris inside the charred ruin is ongoing.

Commander Stuart Cundy, who has overall control of police operations at Grenfell Tower, told reporters on Tuesday it was likely the final death toll would be a little below 80.

Detective Chief Inspector Matt Bonner, in charge of the criminal side of the police investigation, said a forensic examination of the tower would continue into 2018 and would be followed by lengthy laboratory analysis.

“I will seek to identify and deal with whatever offences come to light during that investigation,” he said.

“The kind of stuff that I would envisage we may come across would involve offences perhaps of fraud, misconduct offences, health and safety breaches, breaches of fire safety regulations and of course offences of manslaughter whether that be on a corporate or an individual level,” he added.

However, Bonner said this should not be taken as an indication that police had already found evidence to support any such charges.

The building, which was completed in 1974, was owned by the borough of Kensington and Chelsea, one of London’s richest, and managed by an organization that ran social housing on the borough’s behalf.

Bonner said police had so far identified 336 companies or organizations that were involved in the construction, refurbishment and management of the tower and officers had recovered as many as 31 million documents from all of those.

Police were now also investigating allegations of thefts from some of the less damaged flats in the lower levels of the building. There had been one confirmed theft of a considerable amount of money from one of the flats and three further allegations of theft, they said.

The thefts had come to light when former residents had been let into their apartments to pick up treasured possessions and say goodbye to their homes. Cundy said police had been shocked.

“All of us here, working down on Grenfell Tower or working on it anywhere, are just so disappointed that something like that can happen on the back of such a huge tragedy,” he said.

(Reporting by Estelle Shirbon; editing by Stephen Addison)

More Florida Keys residents return home to survey Irma’s destruction

Residents walk though a debris field of former houses following Hurricane Irma in Islamorada, Florida, U.S., September 15, 2017. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri

By Carlo Allegri

KEY LARGO, Fla. (Reuters) – More residents who had fled the Florida Keys ahead of Hurricane Irma were allowed to return to their homes on Saturday, as authorities prepared to reopen Key West at the end of the devastated archipelago on Sunday.

As Florida struggled to return to normal after the powerful storm struck this week, Governor Rick Scott ordered all nursing homes in the state to obtain emergency generators.

The order followed the deaths of eight elderly people this week at a sweltering nursing home north of Miami that lost power.

“I am outraged over the deaths of eight Floridians at the Rehabilitation Center at Hollywood Hills in Broward County and I am demanding answers as we furiously investigate this terrible loss of life,” Scott said in a statement on Saturday.

Irma was one of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record before striking the U.S. mainland as a Category 4 hurricane on Sept. 10. It killed at least 84 people, many of them in the Caribbean. The storm killed at least 33 in Florida.

In the Keys, Irma tore apart houses, flattened mobile homes and pushed boats onto the highway linking the archipelago, prompting authorities to largely shut down access to the islands. Thousands of anxious residents who evacuated have been pressing to be allowed to return home.

Cudjoe Key, where Irma made landfall in the lower Florida Keys, and nearby areas were especially hard hit.

A resident carries belongings next to a U.S. flag in a debris field of former houses following Hurricane Irma in Islamorada, Florida, U.S., September 15, 2017. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri

A resident carries belongings next to a U.S. flag in a debris field of former houses following Hurricane Irma in Islamorada, Florida, U.S., September 15, 2017. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri

“The damage in those areas is just beyond belief,” Monroe County Mayor George Neugent told the Miami Herald.

Authorities on Saturday allowed local residents to drive to the checkpoint just before Marathon in the middle of the keys, according to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office, which polices the Keys.

Some gasoline stations were reopening, but cell phone service and electricity remained out in most of the islands. Residents were advised to boil water before drinking.

On Sunday morning, residents will regain access to Key West at the end of the archipelago, the Sheriff’s Office said in a statement on its Facebook page.

Florida utilities restored power to more residents on Saturday. The state had 1.1 million customers without electricity, down from 1.5 million on Friday, according to the Florida Division of Emergency Management.

Eight patients at the Rehabilitation Center at Hollywood Hills died this week after being exposed to the heat. The center was left without full air conditioning after the hurricane hit, and the deaths stirred outrage over what many saw as a preventable tragedy.

Scott on Saturday ordered emergency rules requiring all assisted living facilities and nursing homes to obtain a generator within 60 days. The goal is to ensure such facilities can operate for at least 96 hours after an outage.

Administrators at the nursing home said they repeatedly called Florida Power & Light Co and state officials after a transformer powering the home’s air conditioning system went out during the storm on Sunday.

The utility did not arrive until Wednesday after some patients began experiencing health emergencies, prompting evacuation of the center, according to a timeline provided by the nursing home.

Scott on Saturday blamed the nursing home for what he described as its failure to protect life.

“As ANY health care provider knows to do, if their patients are in danger – they MUST call 911,” Scott said in a written statement.

 

(Writing by Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Frank McGurty and David Gregorio)

 

Criminal probe opens into eight deaths at Florida nursing home after Irma

The Rehabilitation Center at Hollywood Hills is seen in Hollywood, north of Miami, Florida, U.S., September 13, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Innerarity

By Andrew Innerarity

HOLLYWOOD, Fla. (Reuters) – Eight elderly patients died after being left inside a stifling South Florida nursing home that lost power during Hurricane Irma, officials said on Wednesday, prompting a criminal probe and adding to the mounting loss of life from the storm.

The overall death toll from Irma climbed to 81 on Wednesday, with several hard-hit Caribbean islands accounting for more than half the fatalities, and officials continued to assess damage inflicted by the second major hurricane to strike the U.S. mainland this year.

Irma killed at least 31 people in Florida, plus seven more in Georgia and South Carolina combined, authorities said.

One of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record, Irma bore down on the Caribbean with devastating force as it raked the northern shore of Cuba last week before barreling into the Florida Keys island chain on Sunday, packing sustained winds of up to 130 miles per hour (215 km per hour).

It then plowed north up the Gulf Coast of the state before dissipating.

In addition to severe flooding across Florida and extensive property damage in the Keys, residents faced widespread power outages that initially plunged more than half the state into darkness.

Some 4.3 million homes and businesses were still without power on Wednesday in Florida and neighboring states, down from 7.4 million customers on Monday.

Three elderly residents were found dead on Wednesday inside a nursing home in Hollywood, Florida, north of Miami. The Rehabilitation Center at Hollywood Hill had been operating with little or no air conditioning, officials said.

Four more patients died at or en route to a nearby hospital and a fifth was later identified as having died the night before.

Governor Rick Scott called the tragedy “unfathomable,” and police said they had opened a criminal investigation, sealing off the building after the remaining patients were transferred to hospitals.

City officials described the interior as “excessively hot,” despite portable air coolers and fans that, according to state records, had been placed throughout the facility.

The eight who died ranged in age from 71 to 99, according to the Broward County medical examiner’s office. The cause of their deaths has yet to be determined.

But most of the survivors were treated for “respiratory distress, dehydration and heat-related issues,” Memorial Regional Hospital’s emergency medical director, Dr. Randy Katz, told reporters.

Representatives of the for-profit nursing home, which had received a “below average” grade from Medicare’s rating system for such facilities, could not immediately be reached for comment.

The physician listed in state records as its manager, Jack Michel, previously ran afoul of state and federal regulators over assisted-living facilities that he partially owned.

In 2006, he and three co-defendants paid $15.4 million to settle Medicare and Medicaid fraud claims against them, according to the U.S. Justice Department.

Flood waters engulf a car after Hurricane Irma in Jacksonville, Florida, U.S. September 12, 2017. REUTERS/Mark Makela

Flood waters engulf a car after Hurricane Irma in Jacksonville, Florida, U.S. September 12, 2017. REUTERS/Mark Makela

TRUMP TO VISIT KEYS

Florida Power & Light provided electricity to parts of the nursing home but the facility was not on a county top-tier list for emergency power restoration, the utility said.

Total insured losses from the storm are expected to run about $25 billion, including $18 billion in the United States and $7 billion in the Caribbean, catastrophe modeler Karen Clark & Company estimated on Wednesday.

The Florida Keys were particularly hard hit, with federal officials saying 90 percent of its homes were destroyed or heavily damaged. The remote island chain stretches nearly 100 miles (160 km) into the Gulf of Mexico from Florida’s southern tip, connected by a single highway and series of bridges.

On Key West, at the end of the archipelago, hundreds of residents who had refused evacuation orders lined up on Wednesday outside the island’s Salvation Army outpost for water and military-style rations after enduring days of intense heat with little water, power or contact with the outside world.

The stench of dead fish and decaying seaweed permeated the air.

Elizabeth Martinez, 61, said the ordeal, including losing part of the roof of her home, had convinced her it was time to leave the island. “I’m saving my money up and moving out of here,” she said.

But David Sheidy, a 58-year-old painter, predicted Key West would bounce back quickly.

“That’s what we do,” he said. “This is a small community where everybody knows each other and takes care of each other.”

President Donald Trump was due to visit Florida on Thursday.

Irma wreaked utter devastation on several of the northern Leeward Islands of the Caribbean, where at least 43 people have died. Irma hit Florida about two weeks after Hurricane Harvey plowed into Houston, killing about 60 and causing some $180 billion in damage, mostly from flooding.

(Additional reporting by Zachary Fagenson in Key West,; Daniel Trotta in Orlando, Florida; Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Letitia Stein in Detroit, Keith Coffman in Denver,; Colleen Jenkins in Winston-Salem, North Carolina,; Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee and Gina Cherelus, Peter Szekeley, Scott DiSavino and Joseph Ax in New York; Writing by Scott Malone and Steve Gorman; Editing by Diane Craft and Lisa Shumaker)

13 killed in gang battles in two Mexican states

Police officers stand guard as they carry out inspections at a checkpoint after 13 people were killed in battles between rival gangs in two states in central and western Mexico, in Uruapan, in the state of Michoacan, Mexico, September 13, 2017. REUTERS/Alan Ortega

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – At least 13 people were killed in battles between rival gangs in two states in central and western Mexico, officials said on Wednesday, as murders climb to record levels this year.

Five people were gunned down in a bar on Tuesday night in the capital of central Guanajuato state while seven people were found dead in two different places in the western state of Michoacan, according to officials at state prosecutors offices.

Three dismembered bodies, including a woman’s, were found in the community of Angahuan near the drug-gang hotbed of Uruapan, the Michoacan prosecutors’ office said.

Michoacan has been one of the bloodiest states in Mexico because of battles between rival gangs involved in drug trafficking, kidnapping, extortion of local businesses as well as mineral theft and illegal logging.

Neighboring Guanajuato state has seen a spike in violence. Murders were up 37 percent in Guanajuato in the first seven months of the year compared to the same period last year.

The murder rate has already risen above levels seen in 2011, which was the deadliest year under former president Felipe Calderon who sent the army out to battle drug gangs.

Nationally, there were 14,190 murder investigations in the first seven months of the year, the highest total through July for any year in records going back to 1997.

The increase in violence has hit the popularity of President Enrique Pena Nieto and his Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) ahead of next year’s presidential election.

(Reporting by Lizbeth Diaz; Editing by Sandra Maler)

Student opens fire at Washington state school, killing classmate

By Dan Whitcomb

(Reuters) – A student carrying two guns opened fire at his high school near Spokane, Washington on Wednesday, killing one classmate and injuring three others before he was apprehended by a staff member, the local sheriff said.

The slain student was trying to convince the shooter, whose first gun had jammed, not to carry out the morning rampage when he was shot dead, Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich told reporters.

The gunman then fired on three other students in a second-floor hallway of Freeman High School in Rockford, Washington, Knezovich said. The surviving victims, who were in their mid-teens, were listed in stable condition, a local hospital said.

Knezovich declined to identify the suspect or discuss what may have motivated the gun violence in detail but said: “It sounds like a case of a bullying-type of situation.”

He said that a member of the staff at Freeman who he described as “very courageous” was able to capture the gunman before police officers arrived on scene to take him into custody. He was being held at Spokane County juvenile jail.

“Fortunately that one (gun) jammed. This would have been a lot worse if it didn’t,” Knezovich said. “These are senseless, tragic events that really don’t need to happen and I don’t really understand them.”

“But we need to figure out what’s gone wrong with our society that our children decide that they need to take weapons to deal with the issues that they’re facing,” he said.

A freshman who witnessed the shooting told local KREM-TV that the shooter, a classmate since elementary school, stalked the hallway with a pistol and second gun, appearing calm as he fired at his victims and the ceiling.

The girl said that the suspect was an “outgoing” boy who she would not have thought capable of such violence. But she said other students had told her that he had made an ominous post about his intentions on a social media account.

Following the shooting at the school of 327 students, some parents abandoned their cars stuck in traffic and walked up to a mile to reach their children, KHQ-TV reported.

“This morning’s shooting at Freeman High School is heartbreaking. All Washingtonians are thinking of the victims and their families,” Governor Jay Inslee said on Twitter.

The United States has had an average of 52 school shooting incidents a year since a gunman killed 26 young children and educators in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012, according to Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun-control group founded in response to that massacre.

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Additional reporting by Suzannah Gonzales in Chicago, Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento and Derek Caney and Gina Cherulus in New York; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

One dead, three wounded in Washington state school shooting

police sirens

By Dan Whitcomb

(Reuters) – One child was killed and three people wounded at a shooting on Wednesday at a high school near Spokane, Washington before a suspect was taken into custody, the local fire chief said.

It was not immediately clear if the slain victim was a student at Freeman High School in Rockford, Washington, Spokane Fire Chief Brian Schaeffer told reporters at a news conference.

Schaeffer said he did not know if the suspect was a student at the school or what may have motivated the gun violence. None of the wounded victims were identified.

The fire chief described a chaotic scene at the school, with the sounds of bullets echoing through the halls prompting fears that there was more than one shooter.

Local television stations showed the school surrounded by police and fire vehicles, parents running the scene. Some parents got out of their cars and walked up to a mile rather than wait in traffic, KHQ-TV reported.

The high school has 327 students, according to U.S. News.

Three victims were in stable condition at Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center and Children’s Hospital in Spokane, said spokeswoman Nicole Stewart.

A Twitter user named Christina identified herself as a junior at the high school and said she had been evacuated following at least four shots. She tweeted a picture of anxious-looking students sitting on the floor in a classroom.

“This morning’s shooting at Freeman High School is heartbreaking. All Washingtonians are thinking of the victims and their families,” Governor Jay Inslee said on Twitter.

Spokane placed all schools in the district on lockdown at about 10:30 a.m. PDT (1730 GMT), following the shooting, but an hour later said on Twitter that it had been lifted.

The United States has had an average of 52 school shooting incidents a year since a gunman killed 26 young children and educators in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012, according to Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun-control group founded in response to that massacre.

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Additional reporting by Suzannah Gonzales in Chicago, Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento and Derek Caney and Gina Cherulus in New York; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

Quake pitches past into present in scarred Mexico City district

Quake pitches past into present in scarred Mexico City district

By Julia Love

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – The powerful earthquake that rocked Mexico City last week had terrifying echoes of a more deadly 1985 shock in one housing project, raising tough questions about how ready one of the world’s largest cities is for a major catastrophe.

At its epicenter, Thursday’s 8.1 magnitude quake was stronger than the disaster three decades ago that killed at least 5,000 people in Mexico City, toppling two tower blocks in the historic central neighborhood of Tlatelolco.

Mexico City has made major advances since then, with regular earthquake simulations, improved building regulations, and seismic alarms designed to sound long enough before the shock to give residents time to flee.

Nearly 100 people are known to have died in the latest quake, none of them in the capital.

Yet experts noted the tremor’s epicenter was further from Mexico City and two times deeper than in 1985, and warned it would be wrong to assume the capital could now rest easy.

Such caution was palpable in Tlatelolco.

Antonio Fonseca, 66, a longtime resident who witnessed the 1985 collapse of the tower blocks in the Nuevo Leon housing complex that killed at least 200 people, said memories of the event sparked panic attacks in the neighborhood when the quake rolled through the city on Thursday.

“I’m quite sure that these buildings are very well reinforced,” said Fonseca, a local history expert. “But there are many people who are still wary.”

When the ground began shaking in September 1985, local workers laughed it off at first, continuing with breakfast. Nobody believed Fonseca when he told them Nuevo Leon had fallen, he recalled.

Later, Fonseca saw a group of children in the neighborhood’s central Plaza de las Tres Culturas who had been waiting for the school bus, their uniforms caked in white dust from the building’s collapse.

This time around, residents feared the worst. Streets filled across the city when the quake hit near midnight. Crying and praying, hundreds descended onto the plaza and some stayed for hours, questioning whether it was safe to return home.

Minerva de la Paz Uribe, a retiree living on the plaza, was unable to evacuate with her father, who turned 104 the next day. She watched from her window as neighbors scrambled to escape.

“People leave running with their dogs. They leave screaming. Are we prepared? No, no, we’re not prepared,” she said, as a group of friends on the plaza murmured in agreement.

Some 30 buildings in Tlatelolco were rebuilt after the 1985 disaster and a dozen were demolished. Mexico’s new skyscrapers include hydraulic shock absorbers and deep foundations.

But such safety features are less prevalent in much of the sprawling periphery, which is filled with cheap cinderblock homes like the buildings that collapsed on Thursday in the southern states of Oaxaca and Chiapas near the epicenter.

CRITICISM OF GOVERNMENT

Situated at the intersection of three tectonic plates, Mexico is one of the world’s most earthquake-prone countries, and the capital is particularly vulnerable due to its location on top of an ancient lake bed.

The government’s widely panned response to the 1985 quake caused upheaval in Mexico, which some credited with weakening the one-party rule of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). After 71 years, the PRI was finally voted out in 2000.

Signs of government incompetence, or worse, persist.

Mexican news website Animal Politico on Monday reported that thousands of seismic alarms acquired by the government of Oaxaca five years ago were never distributed, with some appearing for sale on online auction sites.

A spokesman for Oaxaca’s civil protection authorities did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Mistrust of government has spurred some to form community groups. Among the most famous are the Tlatelolco Topos, or moles, formed from rescue squads that dug survivors and corpses out of the rubble in 1985, and have since traveled the world offering assistance in quakes and landslides.

But disasters have a habit of catching people off guard.

Georgina Mendez de Schaafsma was returning from taking children to school when the 1985 temblor struck Tlatelolco. To her horror, she realized her six-year-old daughter was home alone.

Racing back, Mendez retrieved the girl. But three other relatives died in the Nuevo Leon collapses.

Now 70, Mendez still lives in the same building, which had a number of floors removed after the 1985 quake. She stayed indoors when the tremors began on Thursday night and believes Mexico City is better equipped today – up to a point.

“In a catastrophe, I think we’re never prepared,” she said. “Nature is stronger.”

(Reporting by Julia Love, Additional reporting by Dave Graham, Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)

Mexico rushes aid to millions after huge quake; death toll at 96

Residents walk next to a house destroyed by the earthquake that struck the southern coast of Mexico late on Thursday, in Ixtaltepec, Mexico, September 10, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Jasso

JUCHITAN, Mexico (Reuters) – A powerful earthquake that struck Mexico last week has left some 2.5 million people in need of aid and killed 96 others, authorities said on Monday, as officials rushed to get food and water to afflicted communities in the poor south.

Oaxaca state governor Alejandro Murat told local television the death toll in his state had risen to 76. He said preliminary reports showed that at least 12,000 homes were damaged, and warned the number was likely to rise.

Murat said 1 million people in Oaxaca needed food, water, electricity and help rebuilding damaged homes, while in neighboring Chiapas state, which was closest to the epicenter of the tremor, 1.5 million people were affected, according to officials.

“We are united in facing this humanitarian crisis,” Murat said.

The 8.1-magnitude quake off the coast of Chiapas rattled Mexico City and sowed destruction across the narrowest portion of Mexico on the isthmus of Tehuantepec.

Sixteen people have been reported dead in Chiapas state and four in neighboring Tabasco. Many of the fatalities in Oaxaca were in the town of Juchitan, where more than 5,000 homes were destroyed.

The quake, the most powerful earthquake to hit Mexico in over eight decades, was stronger than a 1985 temblor that killed thousands in Mexico City. However, its greater depth and distance kept the capital from being more serious damaged.

President Enrique Pena Nieto on Friday declared three days of national mourning and pledged to rebuild shattered towns and villages.

 

(Reporting by David Alire Garcia in Juchitan and Sheky Espejo in Mexico City; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)

 

Dissipating storm Katia kills two in mudslide in eastern Mexico

Lifeguards are pictured at a lifeguard post ahead of Hurricane Katia in Veracruz, Mexico, September 7, 2017. REUTERS/Victor Yanez

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Two people died in a mudslide in Mexico sparked by storm Katia, and thousands were left without power as the weather front dissipated inland on Saturday, threatening to dump rains in waterlogged areas also shaken by a major earthquake this week.

The two people died in Xalapa, the capital of Veracruz state, when mud loosened from a hillside by Katia’s rains trapped them in their home, Luis Felipe Puente, head of Mexico’s national emergency services, told Reuters.

Katia weakened rapidly after hitting the land on Friday night, although Veracruz Governor Miguel Angel Yunes said the storm had left some 70,000 people without electricity and caused damage in 53 of the Gulf state’s 212 municipalities.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center said that as a tropical depression, Katia was blowing maximum sustained winds of 35 miles (56 km) per hour as it dissipated over the mountains of central eastern Mexico by midmorning on Saturday.

Mexico is dealing with the aftermath of a huge quake that struck on Thursday night, and President Enrique Pena Nieto said on Friday that Katia could be especially dangerous in hillsides rocked by the magnitude 8.1 tremor.

The earthquake, the strongest to strike Mexico in more than 80 years, killed at least 61 people.

Katia was about 125 miles (201 km) west northwest of the port of Veracruz by midmorning on Saturday, the NHC said, noting that the threat of heavy rainfall continued.

Officials in Veracruz warned that Katia could cause landslides and flooding, and they urged people to evacuate vulnerable areas.

Mexican emergency services said this week that Katia was worrisome because it is very slow-moving and could dump a lot of rain on areas that have been saturated in recent weeks.

State energy company Pemex [PEMX.UL] has installations in and around the coast of Veracruz but has not reported any disruption to its operations there.

As Katia reached the Mexican Gulf Coast, Hurricane Irma, one of the most powerful Atlantic storms in a century, walloped Cuba’s northern coast.

Millions of Florida residents were ordered to evacuate after the storm killed 21 people in the eastern Caribbean and left catastrophic destruction in its wake.

Meanwhile, Hurricane Jose continued to move northwestward in the Atlantic and was blowing winds of 145 mph as a Category 4 storm about 120 miles east of the Northern Leeward Islands at 11 a.m. EDT (1500 GMT) on Saturday.

(Reporting by Dave Graham and Lizbeth Diaz; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)