CANCUN (Mexico), Oct 19: Tens of thousands of tourists and residents in Mexico, Cuba and the United States on Wednesday fled the path of Hurricane Wilma, the strongest hurricane recorded in the Atlantic — packing terrifying 280-kilometer-an-hour winds.

Mexican authorities told tourists on the Yucatan peninsula — a popular sun spot for US and European holiday-makers — to return home. All major hotels were ordered emptied.

About 90,000 people were ordered away from the western Cuban coast. Honduras, Nicaragua, Jamaica and other Caribbean islands were also on alert for the backlash from Wilma which is predicted to smash into the Florida coast this weekend.

Authorities ordered evacuations of high-risk areas along the coast, particularly the island of Mujeres close to the holiday resort of Cancun. Organizers cancelled the MTV Video Music Awards Latin America ceremony, planned for Wednesday night in Cancun, because of the storm.

The peninsula could be hit by Wilma early Friday.

Tourists and non-residents were also told to leave the low-lying Florida Keys island chain off the southern tip of Florida.

The southern US state was bracing for Wilma to arrive late on Saturday, and a state of emergency was declared in the Keys. President George W. Bush has been briefed on the storm, a spokesman said, and he called on Americans to heed warnings about Wilma.

At 1500 GMT, Wilma was about 520 kilometres (325 miles) southeast of the Mexican resort of Cozumel on the Yucatan.

The hurricane’s barometric pressure, 882 millibars, was ‘the lowest pressure on record for a hurricane in the Atlantic basin’, the centre said. The lower the pressure, the stronger the storm is.

At 1200 GMT, winds at the centre of the storm were clocked at 280 kilometres (175 miles) per hour. The hurricane centre said fluctuations in intensity were likely as the record-matching 21st storm of the Atlantic season moved toward land.

“Wilma is a potentially catastrophic” hurricane, the Miami-based monitoring centre said.

Authorities in Cuba, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua and the Cayman Islands have all issued hurricane alerts. Eleven people have been killed in flooding after two weeks of torrential rainfall in much of Haiti over the past two weeks, but authorities made no immediate link to Wilma.

Cuba has ordered 5,000 people evacuated from flood-prone areas along the storm’s path.

Honduras also ordered preparations for evacuations as heavy rain began to fall. Widespread flooding was reported in Jamaica from rainfall sparked by the hurricane, and nearly 25 inches (64 centimetres) of rain was expected to drench mountainous areas of Cuba through Friday.

World oil prices have eased, however, amid hopes that Wilma would not hit oil installations on the storm-weary US Gulf Coast.

It is the 12th full-blown hurricane of the Atlantic season, and a series of the storms have left thousands dead in Central America and along the US Gulf Coast.

Hurricane Katrina killed more than 1,200 people on the US Gulf Coast after it struck on August 29, and Hurricane Stan left more than 2,000 dead in Guatemala alone earlier this month. Dozens more were killed by the storm in El Salvador, Nicaragua and Mexico.

Florida has already been battered by hurricanes Dennis and Katrina this year, and the state’s governor, Jeb Bush, brother of US President George W. Bush, was downcast at the prospect of a fresh hit.

“Why us?” he said. “How does a storm take a sharp 90-degree turn?”—AFP