Looting broke out in the flooded Mexican beach resort of Acapulco as the government struggled to reach tens of thousands of people cut off by flooding that had claimed at least 80 lives.
Stores were ransacked by looters who carried off everything from televisions to Christmas decorations after the Pacific port experienced some of the worst storm damage to hit Mexico in years.
Tens of thousands of people have been trapped in the aftermath of two tropical storms that hammered vast swathes of Mexico, Reuters reports. More than 1 million people have been affected. Acapulco's airport terminal was under water, stranding tourists.
The rains pummeled several Mexican states, with Veracruz, Guerrero, Puebla, Hidalgo, Michoacan, Tamaulipas and Oaxaca among the hardest hit.
Landslides have buried homes and a bus in Veracruz on Mexico's eastern seaboard. Thousands were evacuated from flooded areas, some by helicopter, and taken to shelters.
Dozens of homes in Tampico, one of the main Gulf ports north of Veracruz, were waterlogged when the Panuco River burst its banks, forcing evacuations. Crocodiles swam into the streets of Tampico.
Acapulco is struggling to cope with the downpour that has submerged vast areas of the city, choked its palm-lined streets with mud and stranded about 40,000 visitors.
More than half of the deaths occurred in Guerrero, where Acapulco lies. Despite the loss of life, state governor Angela Aguirre says the beach resort is "virtually back to normality".
Northwest of Acapulco in the village of La Pintada, rescue workers recovered the bodies of 18 people killed after a landslide buried their homes, the town's mayor says.
That death toll could rise because more than 60 people in the area have disappeared.
Torrential rains were spawned by two tropical storms, Ingrid and Manuel, which converged on Mexico from the Gulf and the Pacific over the weekend, triggering the flash floods.
Rescue workers in the state of Baja California Sur, home to the popular beach resorts of Los Cabos, prepared to evacuate people from flood-prone areas.
