Hurricane Wilma thundered toward Florida on Sunday after devastating Mexico's Caribbean resorts with floodwaters and wild winds that smashed thousands of homes and killed at least seven people, according to Reuters. While residents of the Florida Keys hunkered down for battering winds and a powerful surge of floodwaters, dazed tourists waded through knee-deep water in the streets of Mexico's beach resort Cancun to seek food and water after three nights in damp shelters without electricity. At one point the most intense hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic basin, Wilma weakened as it hammered Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula for days, but still carried 100 mph (160 kph) winds toward the fragile Florida Keys, where many storm-weary residents ignored evacuation orders. "We were all packed and ready to go. But personally, now I feel we will be safe and better off here," said Lori Thompson, who had considered leaving Key West and driving to Orlando with her fiance. Light traffic along the Overseas Highway, the only road out of the 110-mile (176-km) island chain, and the possibility of a storm surge that could swamp the low-lying islands and southwest Florida coast, had officials fretting that too many people were taking Wilma too lightly. --More 2318 Local Time 2018 GMT
