By Associated Press
Majahual, Mexico – Hurricane Dean is bearing down on the heart of Mexico's oil industry, after slamming into the Yucatan Peninsula yesterday as one of the biggest storms in history, a powerful, Category Five hurricane with 165-mile-an-hour winds.
There are no reported deaths in Mexico, but intense rain, poor communications and impassable roads have make it impossible to say what impact the storm had on isolated jungle villages. Dean is blamed in more than a dozen deaths during its earlier sweep through the eastern Caribbean.
One woman who road it out in a brick house describes it as hours of terror. Hundreds of homes collapsed in a fishing village that took a direct hit.
Dean's 80-mile-an-hour winds make it still a Category One hurricane as it moves over the Bay of Campeche, home to more than 100 oil platforms and three major oil ports.
The National Hurricane Center says it could intensify a bit before making a landfall on the Mexican mainland this afternoon.