CABO SAN LUCAS, Mexico -- Maids swept water from hotel lobbies and tourists scurried across flooded streets as a tropical storm dumped heavy rain on this fishing resort at the tip of Mexico's Baja California peninsula before slipping out to sea.
Greg, which was downgraded from hurricane status Tuesday, forced hundreds of local people to flee their humble shacks of cardboard and plywood to spend a second night in emergency shelters.American vacationers grumbled over canceled flights and headed back to their hotels hoping to book passage home Wednesday.
The storm proved to be a nuisance for tourists and a disaster for Cabo San Lucas' poorest residents, many of whom work in the luxury hotels lining the dramatic Pacific coastline.
Cira Mejia Jacinto broke into tears at the Heroes of 1846 primary school, where she and her five young children sought refuge after the rain ruined their newly built cardboard shack a few miles from the hotel district.
The family had just moved to Cabo San Lucas from Guerrero state, one of Mexico's poorest, but her husband had yet to find work, Mejia explained.
"The water came in and got us wet," she said. "We arrived here only recently. We don't even have money to eat."
At 2 a.m. EDT, Greg's center was located 60 miles northwest of the southern tip of Baja California, creeping slowly northwestward, away from the Baja coast. The U.S. Hurricane Center in Miami said Greg's sustained winds had fallen to about 50 mph.
The Mexican government downgraded hurricane alerts to tropical storm warnings on the southern part of the peninsula.
Rains associated with the storm reportedly caused three deaths Monday in the mainland coastal state of Michoacan.
A state government pilot died after his helicopter crashed while on a relief mission to flooded communities, and two more people were killed when a wall collapsed, apparently as a result of the rains, the government news agency Notimex reported.