Hurricane Simon lashes Mexico’s Pacific coast, threatening landfall

Hurricane Simon battered Mexico's Pacific coast with powerful winds and torrential rain on Monday, the US National Hurricane Center warned, threatening to make landfall later in the week. The Category 3 storm, downgraded from its initial Category 4 status, moved slowly and posed a significant threat. According to the NHC, Simon was about 50 miles off Cabo Corrientes in Mexico's Jalisco state early Monday, with maximum sustained winds of 185 kilometers per hour.

Initial forecasts had predicted a landfall on Sunday around midday local time, but now experts anticipate the hurricane will make landfall somewhere along the west-central Mexico coastline by midweek. Dangerous winds and heavy rainfall continued to affect the coast, the NHC reported. El Nino, a warming ocean phenomenon, has fueled the recent surge in Pacific storms, allowing them to intensify despite the typical weakening effects of El Nino on Atlantic hurricanes.