Hurricane Polo, having regained strength, drenches the Pacific coast and heads for Baja

The still extremely powerful Hurricane Polo continues to threaten Pacific coast states with flooding rain, high winds and high surf as it oscillates between Category 4 and Category 5 on the Saffir Simpson scale. 

In an update issued at 9:15 a.m. Thursday, the National Meteorological Service (SMN)   warned that “the likelihood of very heavy to locally intense rainfall in western and southern states” would continue to be a concern. 

#AvisoMeteorológico #Polo, #Huracán categoría 4, está a 245 km al sur de Manzanillo, #Colima. Más información de este sistema en https://t.co/MwRQe1e4aZ pic.twitter.com/9MmYN4SQi6

— CONAGUA Clima (@conagua_clima) September 24, 2026

Strong winds and high waves were expected along the coasts, it said, specifically identifying the states of Colima, Jalisco, Michoacán and Guerrero. Intense rains and torrential downpours (150 to 250 mm) were forecast for coastal areas of Michoacán and Guerrero through early afternoon.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) forecast tropical storm conditions across portions of the coast within the warning area from Tecpan de Galeana, Guerrero, north to Manzanillo, Colima. 

Polo is expected to remain a major hurricane for the next few days and could strengthen yet again. In the meantime, it is currently sending hurricane-force winds outward up to 40 miles from its center and tropical storm-force winds some 125 miles out.

The NHC also projected that Polo — which was about 175 miles west-southwest of Zihuatanejo, Guerrero, and moving northwest at 9 mph — would move farther out to sea by Friday morning before approaching the Baja California Peninsula early next week. However, its core is expected to remain offshore rather than make landfall.

Polo is an unusual, record-setting hurricane

Polo was packing maximum sustained winds of 160 mph on Thursday, after wind speeds went from 85 mph to a peak of 180 mph (the second-strongest eastern Pacific hurricane on record) in just 22 hours earlier in the week.

Its transition from a “disorganized tropical depression” to a Category 5 hurricane was the fastest of any system on record in the Western Hemisphere.

Since then it has lost some strength, regained it, and then lost some of it again, moving back and forth between Categories 4 and 5. It could likely regain strength yet again.

Polo also tied Hurricane Rita (2005) as the warmest on record (determined by flight-level temperature readings inside a hurricane’s eye), surpassing some of the most intense Western Pacific super typhoons ever directly observed, according to Michael Lowry, a Miami-based hurricane specialist cited by USA Today.