Guadalajara, Mexico, Oct 23 (EFE). – Thousands of residents and tourists on the Pacific coasts of the Mexican states of Jalisco, Colima and Nayarit were evacuated as landfall approached for Hurricane Patricia, described as the most powerful tropical system in history.

National emergency management office chief Luis Felipe Puente told media that since Thursday the evacuation of some 50,000 people had been underway on stretches of the coastline expecting to be hit by Patricia, a Category 5 storm with maximum sustained winds of 325 kph (200 mph).

The hurricane made landfall late Friday in Jalisco.

As the storm approached, more than 10,000 military personnel and Federal Police deployed to “provide immediate help,” Puente’s aide, Jose Maria Tapia, told a press conference.

Around 400,000 inhabitants of the three states could be in the path of the hurricane, which is expected to bring torrential rains.

Communications and Transportation Secretary Gerardo Ruiz Esparza, directing operations from Jalisco, told a press conference that around 4 p.m. giant waves from 6 to 10 meters (20 to 33 feet) were expected along the Jalisco coast.

Forecast for around 7 p.m. is the arrival in Jalisco of the eye of Patricia, which began forming Tuesday as a tropical storm over waters of the Pacific Ocean and on Thursday was upgraded to a hurricane.

According to sources in the Jalisco state government, some 15,000 tourists were evacuated from the coastal area in the last few hours, 11,000 of them from Puerto Vallarta.

Ruiz Esparza said that a land bridge had been established with buses to evacuate the population from Vallarta to Guadalajara, the state capital.

Many area inhabitants had been leaving for Guadalajara by their own means since Thursday, which has jammed the highway with traffic.

Following alerts by the authorities and predictions of food scarcities and a shortage of other basic products, shoppers have been pouring into stores, chiefly in towns along the beaches.

Ruiz Esparza gave assurances Friday that there will be plenty of food and water in the area, and that provisions will be distributed to local residents, but added that “at critical moments” after the hurricane strikes there could be problems of supply.

He also said that security forces will be stationed in municipalities to defend them against looting. EFE