Hurricane Jova Update

Hurricane Jova bore down on the Pacific coast of southwest Mexico on Tuesday threatening to pound one of the country's busiest cargo ports and tourist resorts with destructive waves, heavy rainfall and flooding.

The Category 3 storm, with top winds reaching 115 miles per hour, was about 150 miles southwest of the port city of Manzanillo at 5 a.m. EDT, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.

Jova should make landfall on Tuesday afternoon or evening to the northwest of Manzanillo near the resort towns of Melaque and Barra de Navidad on a stretch of coast dotted with beaches south of Puerto Vallarta.

Manzanillo, Mexico's main point of arrival for cargo containers, has been closed since late Sunday and about 13 container ships are stuck in the port.

An official said shipments that were held up because of the lock-down, included 15,000 tonnes of sugar from Colombia, 16,000 tonnes of imported rolled steel and a shipment of iron pellets for domestic use.

Manzanillo handles about 750 containers of cargo a month and ships goods including cars, car parts, cattle, minerals and tequila to Asian and North American markets.