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Chase Account:
My first Pacific
Hurricane chase is in the books. Overall it was an intense
experience and I learned a lot about this part of Mexico for
future Hurricane chases. I'm disappointed I was not able to
document more of it to share with everyone. This chase
reminds me of Cat 4 Hurricane Emily in Playa del Carmen,
Mexico because all of it happened in the darkness of the
night. If Jova had sped up or slowed down in forward speed
it might have struck during daytime and I was hoping for
this not only for documentation reasons but also a Hurricane
at night is way more dangerous for the local people simply
because they can't see what's happening. At least if its
daylight outside people might be able to react to flying
debris, mudslides and rockslides etc...
The Hurricane force
wind field of this storm was very compact. At dusk there was
very little wind or rain and I kept looking at the satellite
images and couldn't figure out where was the wind??.....It
was so strange, once the sun set and it was dark outside the
winds suddenly picked up fiercely and started pounding the
building I took shelter in. The surf ran way up on the beach
and the waves were pounding the buildings and spraying up
over everything at the pool. The wind was screaming and
howling and the glass was flying. The Spanish tiles were
getting ripped off the roof and all the glass light fixture
were popping like balloons. The audio was insane and the
fact that it was pitch black outside was ripping me apart. I
wanted to document this event so badly in good quality but
just couldn't make it work. If you look at the photo I
included in this blog it looks like there were lots of
lights but in fact this is a still photo with a super duper
high ISO and long exposure so the little bit of light that
was available made for a decent still photo, grainy but
decent. But as far as video, it was a no-go from this
location. Ma Nature did not want me to get video of her wind
during Jova. I shot some video for the audio that I will be
posting in a few days...
Daybreak...The wind
completely STOPPED just before morning light and it was only
raining outside like a tropical rain storm. So the plan was
to head out at daybreak and get video of possible
mudslides/rockslide and try to document some aspect of Jova.
Problem was all this rain created massive flooding at our
location and we were trapped. There was no way out via
automobile. We waited and waited and waited. Watching the
water slowly drain was as painful as watching paint dry.
There was no power, internet, cellphone or anything ! A man
came down the hill to our location and told us he rode out
the Hurricane roughly 20 minutes to our North on highway 200
and he was in the calm eye that lasted for 30 minutes. I
knew I was close but wasn't sure how close since I had no
internet, phone or power for over 14 hours at that point. At
my location I recorded a barometric pressure of 986mb. I was
in a resort area in between the towns of La Manzanilla and
Emiliano Zapata. I was in a building right on the beach in
the tip of land that sticks out called Tenacatita...
Eventually by late
afternoon the water receded enough to allow us to make a
break for it. We made it out of this flooded area only to
find many mudslides and rockslides. The Army was out in the
streets clearing the roads and assessing the damage. We
carefully drove 10 hours from our location to Guadalajara to
catch our plane and fly home.....
As far as damage, I think on a widespread scale the
mudslides were the big issue as rivers swelled and washed
away roadways. We witnessed many giant rocks in the road
that could crush a car like a tin can. There was a stretch
on highway 200 with trees ripped to shreds from the eyewall
of Jova and lots of flooding.
We pray for the residents of these areas hit by Hurricane
Jova......
Mike Theiss
Twitter Updates:
@MikeTheiss |
