Aid Begins To Arrive In Mexico

Residents and tourists wandered the flooded streets of Cancun in search of food Sunday, as the sun returned to Mexico's hurricane-battered resort coastline and military convoys arrived with water, medical aid and other supplies.

About 30,000 people had weathered Hurricane Wilma's screaming winds and torrential rains for two days in sweltering, leaky shelters. The majority were tourists who couldn't be evacuated before the storm hit.

State officials said three people died in Mexico during the storm. One was hit by a falling tree and two others died from injuries they received when a gas tank exploded. Four badly decomposed bodies were found floating in flood waters on Cozumel Island, but officials said it was unclear if the deaths were related to the storm.

The storm earlier killed 13 people in Jamaica and Haiti.

In Cancun, people waded through submerged streets, trying to start flooded cars or clear debris from their homes.

Tourist Linda Plourde, 54, of Stoney Creek, Ontario, snapped photos of the scene in front of the hotel where she sought shelter.

"Why not look at this as an adventure and try to have some fun?" she said. "Misery takes more energy."

After pummeling the Yucatan for two days, Wilma was downgraded to a Category 2 hurricane with winds of 100 mph as it started to drift northward. It was picking up speed Sunday and was expected to sideswipe Cuba, then slam into Florida on Monday.

The storm could drop an additional 10 to 15 inches of rain on the already saturated Yucatan before moving on, the hurricane center said.

By 2 p.m. EDT on Sunday, Wilma had maximum sustained wind near 100 mph. It was centered about 240 miles west-southwest of Key West and was moving toward the northeast at about 12 mph, the hurricane center said.

President Vicente Fox planned to travel to the affected region on Sunday, as the army and navy began moving in emergency supplies, including food, water, medicine and roofing.

The U.S. Embassy was sending consular officials to shelters to help American tourists prepare for their eventual evacuation. The U.S. government also offered to donate $200,000 in hurricane aid.

On Saturday, the hurricane sent water surging over the narrow strip of sand housing Cancun's luxury hotels and raucous bars, joining the sea with the resort's alligator-infested lagoon. Lobbies were gutted as waves from the open sea slammed into some low-lying hotels, Quintana Roo state Gov. Felix Gonzalez said.

Downtown Cancun was littered with glass, tree trunks and cars up to their roofs in water. The front half of a Burger King had collapsed and at least one gas station had its roof blown away.

Devastating winds and rains trapped tourists inside Cancun's school shelters, where CBS News producer Ben Ferguson reports the conditions are hellish.

"People were sleeping in desks, on top of desks and on the floor in the water. Several of our windows blew out. It was basically just 17 hours of in the dark — just completely soaking wet," reports Ferguson.

Quintana Roo's state civil protection director, Maj. Jose Nemecio, said a few crews were able to begin distributing emergency supplies in Playa del Carmen, to the south of Cancun, where screaming winds had flattened wood-and-tarpaper houses.

On Cozumel, isolated since weathering the brunt of the storm on Friday, authorities were not yet able to assess the full extent of the damage as winds made air surveillance almost impossible. The storm washed away a jetty and did heavy damage to naval facilities. Three feet of water blocked coastal highways.

In Cancun, the wind ripped part of the ceiling off a gymnasium being used as a shelter, forcing the evacuation of more than 1,000 people late Friday.

Stacy Presley, a 22-year-old honeymooner from Milwaukee, was among them. She and 120 others were moved to a kindergarten where they had to sleep on miniature desks nearly submerged in rising flood waters.

"There were people getting sick from the urine on the floor," she said. "We had to do something, so we took off. We were running through flooded streets, passing downed power lines."

She ended up at another school sheltering more than 2,000 people. It had mats to sleep on, emergency officials and supplies.

Well inland, Juan Carlos Fernandez, a 39-year-old clothing designer, said the winds were so strong that he and two friends shuttered themselves in a closet.

"Everything went flying. The electric garage door went flying," he said. "I'm afraid — very, very afraid."

Even as it battered Mexico, Wilma's outer bands pounded western Cuba, where the government evacuated more than 500,000 people, reports CBS News' Portia Siegelbaum. Forecasters said Wilma could bring more than 3 feet of rain to parts of Cuba.

"They take them to larger towns more to the center of the province, or even, if it's necessary, they bring them as far toward the east as the capital," Siegelbaum reports from Havana.

A tornado that spun off from the storm flattened 20 homes and several tobacco-curing huts in Cuba as well.

The twister demolished the wooden home of Caridad Garcia, who huddled with her family in the bathroom, the only room left standing. "It sounded like the world was coming to an end," said Garcia, 58.

The twister demolished the wooden home of Caridad Garcia, who huddled with her family in the bathroom, the only room left standing. "It sounded like the world was coming to an end," said Garcia, 58.

In Florida, residents streamed out of the Keys and coastal communities under mandatory evacuation orders after officials posted a hurricane warning for the entire southern peninsula, the Florida Keys, Florida Bay and the Dry Tortugas.

The Bahamas also issued a hurricane warning Sunday for the northwestern part of the country.