Cruise passengers counting Costa Maya, Mexico, among their stops on Carnival Cruise Line's Fantasy ship may have to settle instead for Key West, Fla. Early indicators are that the region located between Belize and Cancun was heavily damaged when Hurricane Dean made landfall as a Category 5 storm on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula this week.
Carnival is "still awaiting damage assessments, but it does not look like we will be returning for some time," company spokesman Vance Gulliksen said. Hurricane Dean washed away parts of Costa Maya's concrete cruise docks, which are located near the rural town of Majahual.
Costa Maya is typically one of two stops for the 2,056-passenger Fantasy, which sails on four and five-day cruises from the Port of New Orleans. On its current voyage, the vessel substituted Key West for the Costa Maya stop, but continued on to Cozumel, which like many other tourist destinations in Mexico and the Caribbean dodged a bullet.
The only real question mark is Costa Maya. That would be the only one of the typical Mexico ports that looks like it might not be OK," said Bob Wall, president of Adventures at Sea, a local travel agency.
"Might not be OK," is an understatement... apparaently, he hasn't seen the reports and pictures that we've seen . . .
By Matt Hannafin August 22, 2007Most Cruise Ports Spared Damage from Hurricane Dean
Hurricane Dean, the first major hurricane of the 2007 season, swept through the Caribbean earlier this week, killing at least 14 people and damaging homes, agriculture, and infrastructure from the Lesser Antilles to Mexico's Gulf coast. Many ships sailing the region altered their itineraries to keep clear of the storm, and the vast majority of cruise ports were spared damage.
Except Costa Maya. The purpose-built cruise destination, located on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, 100 miles south of Playa del Carmen and near the Mexico/Belize border, took a direct hit from the storm and suffered extensive damage. According to Costa Maya's director of sales and marketing, Cesar Lizarraga, damages run into the millions and affect approximately 50 percent of the port's infrastructure, including the cruise ship pier. Early estimates indicate the port will remain closed at least through the remainder of 2007, with reopening projected in early or mid-2008.
The Costa Maya complex opened in 2001 to be a self-contained stop for up to three large cruise ships at a time, with a lavish oceanfront shopping and restaurant complex, a 650-seat amphitheater for cultural performances, two saltwater pools, a pool bar, and daily entertainment right on site. The nearby Maya ruins of Kohunlich and Chacchoben are the big draw, along with silky white beaches and diving and snorkeling at the Chincorro, Mexico's largest coral atoll. Any damage to these sites is not yet known.
The storm spared the Yucatan's other major ports, Cozumel and Playa Del Carmen, which were heavily damaged in 2005 by Hurricane Wilma.
I am still looking for more pictures of the actual port. Just saw the pic of the pier above from the newspaper, and that is compelling. That pier was just so solid - they had trams running on it for people who couldn't walk the entire length.
Agence France-Presse
Last updated 06:13am (Mla time) 08/23/2007
NAUTLA, Mexico -- Hurricane Dean on Wednesday hit Mexico for a second time in two days, blasting the eastern state of Veracruz with strong winds and pounding rain threatening to trigger dangerous floods and mudslides.
Dean was little more than a shadow of the monster storm that roared onto Mexico's Caribbean coast on Tuesday, but authorities worried that as many as 3.5 million residents could be at risk from swelling rivers and landslides.
"What keeps us in a state of alert is the enormous amount of water," Veracruz Governor Fidel Herrera told Televisa television.
More than 10,000 people had been ordered to head to safer ground just before Dean hit shore 65 kilometers (40 miles) south-southeast of the port city of Tuxpan.
In Poza Rica, children had to be rescued at the height of the storm as winds tore off the roof of a hospital, Herrera told CNN.
Evacuation orders covered parts of Tuxpan, a transfer point for oil extracted offshore, and low-lying areas of the city of Poza Rica, which has several oil refineries.
The Petroleos Mexicanos (PEMEX) state oil company had earlier evacuated all 18,000 personnel from its offshore oil installations in the Gulf of Mexico, causing a production drop of two million barrels day, or two thirds of the country's daily production.
In Nautla, a small community near where Dean made landfall, residents were riding the storm out in an emergency shelter set up in a sports center.
Power was cut off as a precaution as driving rain and strong winds lashed the area.
In nearby San Rafael, many residents anticipating major flooding moved furniture to the upper floors of their homes before heading to emergency shelters.
Herrera declared a state of emergency in 89 Veracruz municipalities, saying a total of 3.5 million people were potentially at risk.
Dean hit shore with maximum sustained winds of 160 kilometers (100 miles), but rapidly weakened further as it swirled over land and was expected to fizzle out altogether as it hits mountainous areas during the night.
When it roared onto the Caribbean coast on Tuesday, Dean packed maximum sustained winds of 270 kilometers (165 miles) per hour. That made it the first Atlantic hurricane to make landfall at the topmost category five since Andrew ravaged Florida in 1992.
Despite its initial power, there were no reports of fatalities after Dean hit land in a sparsely populated area Tuesday. It then lost power as it crossed the Yucatan Peninsula and only regained a little of its punch over the Gulf of Mexico.
It flooded some areas, shattered windows, destroyed bus shelters, uprooted trees and caused power outages on its way across the peninsula. But there were none of the catastrophic damages initially feared, and the storm spared Cancun and other major tourist resorts along Mexico's Caribbean coast.
Mexican President Felipe Calderon was in the Yucatan Peninsula Wednesday to survey the damage, after expressing concern over the fate of isolated and impoverished indigenous communities along the storm's path.
Authorities in neighboring Belize said the small Central American country did suffer some damage to buildings, but did not report any deaths.
Before it hit Mexico, Hurricane Dean was blamed for four deaths in Haiti, two in the Dominican Republic, two in Martinique and one in Jamaica.
This is to answer to Char's question earlier about name this storm will have if it crosses into the Pacific.
If it is still being called Dean when it enters the Pacific, it remains Dean.
If Dean totally dissappates to where it is no longer called Dean on land, and then the remnants reorganize in the Pacific, it will get a new name should it reach TS windspeeds.
I heard it on the TV at lunch and thought of everyone here.
Cruise Line Fans: Cruise Forum, Reviews and Chat From Real Cruisers
-
Centrum Deck
-
Cruise Places
-
Costa Maya
-
Hurricane Dean reports- Costa Maya / Majahual
#
We shall see what tomorrow brings.
#
Linear Mode
