Hurricane Otto weakens as focus shifts to risk of landslides and flooding
Tropical storm Otto heads towards Pacific after becoming the southernmost hurricane on record to hit central America
Hurricane Otto weakened to a tropical storm early on Friday after making landfall as the southernmost hurricane on record to hit central America.
It headed toward the Pacific ocean early on Friday after dumping rain on Costa Rica and Nicaragua and sparking emergency measures across a region that was also hit by a 7-magnitude earthquake.
Attention is now turning towards the risk of landslides and flooding, with Nicaragua continuing to evacuate people near the storms path.
Otto reached Nicaraguas Caribbean coast on Thursday as a category two storm but immediately began fading as it crossed land, becoming a tropical storm by nightfall. It was expected to emerge over the eastern Pacific early on Friday.
Authorities in Nicaragua said the hurricane had damaged houses, but so far there were no reports of casualties. Earlier, heavy rains from the storm were blamed for three deaths in Panama.
Otto battered Nicaraguas Corn Islands with 3.5-meter waves and damaged property but residents were all safe in refuges, said the archipelagos mayor, Cleveland Rolando Webster.
Alicia Lampson, 21, arrived at a shelter with a group of people from the village of Monkey Point, south of Bluefields, Nicaragua. She said: There is a lot of rain, the sea is rough and the wind is strong. We have been in danger all night, getting cold and wet.
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The US National Hurricane Center said the unusually strong late-season hurricane hit land in Nicaragua just north of the Costa Rican border. By late Thursday night, it was located about 30km (20 miles) north of Liberia, Costa Rica.
The Nicaraguan government declared a state of emergency, though in Bluefields the nearest major town on the Nicaraguan coast residents rode out the hurricane.
In our house, we have packed up some things in plastic bags and we went out to buy some provisions, just in case, said resident Jean Hodgson.
Nicaragua closed schools and was evacuating more than 10,000 people from communities in the storms path. Heavy rains were expected to affect the entire country, raising the possibility of flooding and landslides.
Officials in Costa Rica ordered the evacuation of 4,000 people from its Caribbean coast and called off school nationwide for the rest of the week.
Costa Ricas president, Luis Guillermo Sols, said Otto could damage the countrys important coffee and agriculture sectors. Nicaragua also feared damage to coffee crops that are almost ready for harvest.