Thousands have gotten out, but thousands more tourists remain stranded in this Caribbean resort city pounded for two days by Hurricane Wilma.
Tourism officials estimated that mostly charter flights took about 6,000 people out of Cancun airport on Tuesday, while thousands more were bused to planes in Merida, a 280km trip that normally takes four hours but which has been lengthened by heavy traffic and partially flooded roads.
"Enough's enough," Paul Bracey, 45, of Wales, said at a hotel serving as a shelter in Cancun as he waited for a bus to Merida late on Tuesday night. "We're still stranded, and have been told six days of lies. Soon we can have something real to eat, have a shower."
Officials said about 22,000 foreign tourists remained in the area on Tuesday, down from a peak of almost 40,000 during the storm.
There was still had no solid estimate of the damage caused by Wilma, which lashed the coast on Friday and Saturday and wiped out the heart of Mexico's US$11 billion foreign tourism industry, even washing away much of Cancun's famed white beachfront.
Aurelio Fernandez 35, a carpenter from Spain said he planned to fly back on a charter flight from Merida yesterday, leaving behind a suitcase at a Cancun airport locker.
"I'm leaving, but my bag isn't," said Fernandez, said at a hotel where he was evacuated; officials cleared the school where he was originally sheltered after looting broke out in the area.
"It was the most refreshing of my life," Fernandez said of a shower he took at a hotel still being used a shelter, the first he had had in five days.
Cancun was still without electricity on Tuesday, but generators began to hum to life as gasoline became more widely available, bringing light and water back to many hotels.
Colonel Robert Martin, defense attache for the British embassy, said 8,000 British tourists were still in Cancun.
"There are 200 hotels and 150 shelters here," Martin said. "It takes time to reach them all."
Eric and Michelle Joseph, honeymooners from San Jose, California, said that a river of human waste had run through hallways at the hotel where 1,200 tourists were sheltered during the storm.
At the height of the flooding, tourists had to use a ladder to climb out of the hotel from the second floor because of flooding.
"Our whole family is calling senators, congressman and Governor Schwarzenegger," said Eric Joseph, 26. "My Cingular [cellular phone] bill is probably going to be US$3,000."
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and
Packed crowds in India celebrating their cricket team’s victory ended in a deadly stampede on Wednesday, with 11 mainly young fans crushed to death, the local state’s chief minister said. Joyous cricket fans had come out to celebrate and welcome home their heroes, Royal Challengers Bengaluru, after they beat Punjab Kings in a roller-coaster Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket final on Tuesday night. However, the euphoria of the vast crowds in the southern tech city of Bengaluru ended in disaster, with Indian Prime Minister Narendra calling it “absolutely heartrending.” Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said most of the deceased are young, with 11 dead
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
DENIAL: Musk said that the ‘New York Times was lying their ass off,’ after it reported he used so much drugs that he developed bladder problems Elon Musk on Saturday denied a report that he used ketamine and other drugs extensively last year on the US presidential campaign trail. The New York Times on Friday reported that the billionaire adviser to US President Donald Trump used so much ketamine, a powerful anesthetic, that he developed bladder problems. The newspaper said the world’s richest person also took ecstasy and mushrooms, and traveled with a pill box last year, adding that it was not known whether Musk also took drugs while heading the so-called US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) after Trump took power in January. In a
RSS