Tropical Storm Beryl was blowing out to the Gulf of Mexico on Friday afternoon. She appeared likely to reach Texas by late Sunday after its strong winds and heavy rain largely spared Mexico’s top beach destinations.
The storm’s core downgraded from a hurricane, crossed the Yucatan Peninsula, with its maximum wind speeds slowing to around 65 miles mph (105 kph) after striking near the coastal beach resort of Tulum in the morning.
As of Saturday morning, Beryl was around 460 miles southeast of Corpus Christi with maximum sustained winds around 60 mph, the National Hurricane Center said.
Parts of the Lone Star State are under a hurricane watch, and the storm is expected to intensify between Sunday and Monday.
Meteorologists warned that “there is an increasing risk of life-threatening storm surge for the Texas Coast.”
The storm, which at one point intensified to a massive Category 5 hurricane, left a deadly trail of destruction across the Caribbean earlier this week. However, there were no casualties in Mexico, the head of the country’s civil protection agency Laura Velazquez said in a press conference on Friday afternoon.
