Just 15 minutes before floodwaters surged into her home, Lilia Ramírez fled with only what she could carry. When she returned, the damage was overwhelming — not only had water reached the ceiling of her ground floor, but the flood had left behind black oil streaks on her walls.
Poza Rica, an oil-producing town near the Gulf of Mexico, is among the hardest-hit areas by severe flooding that has now claimed 64 lives across five Mexican states. Another 65 people remain missing. Compounding the devastation, oil residue — likely stirred by the flood — has tainted homes, trees, and vehicles in this historically petroleum-rich region.
“This has never happened before — the oil staining everything,” Ramírez said, standing in what remained of her home, her once-pink walls now covered in dark streaks.
Authorities report around 100,000 homes have been damaged across the region. In response, the Mexican government has deployed 10,000 military personnel, along with civilian emergency responders. Helicopters are delivering food and water to the roughly 200 isolated communities, and evacuating the injured.
“We’re still in the emergency phase, and we won’t be cutting back on resources,” President Claudia Sheinbaum assured during her daily press conference on Monday.
In Poza Rica, located about 170 miles (275 km) northeast of Mexico City, cleanup efforts are hampered by layers of oily mud and debris covering streets, rooftops, and uprooted vehicles — remnants of the destructive current that tore through the town on Friday.
From October 6 to 9, parts of Veracruz state saw an astonishing 24.7 inches (62.7 cm) of rainfall.
Ramírez noted that during past floods, state oil company Pemex had intervened to drain oil from nearby areas, but that didn’t happen this time.
Roberto Olvera, a neighbor, recalled that a siren from a nearby Pemex site served as a last-minute warning. “It was terrifying — many people in the neighborhood stayed behind, and some didn’t survive,” he said.
Pemex, in a short statement to the AP, said it had no reports of an oil spill in the area.
President Sheinbaum acknowledged that it may take several more days to reach the most isolated communities. “Numerous flights are still needed to deliver adequate supplies of food and water,” she explained.
She also defended the government’s preparedness, arguing that the flooding was harder to predict than a hurricane. “It’s not the same as having days of warning like we do with hurricanes,” she said.
Mexico’s Civil Protection agency updated the fatality count as of Monday morning:29 deaths in Veracruz, 21 in Hidalgo, 13 in Puebla, and 1 child in Querétaro, killed in a landslide.
The extreme weather was triggered by two tropical systems — Hurricane Priscilla and Tropical Storm Raymond — that formed off Mexico’s Pacific coast and have since dissipated.
