Hurricane Rina is not expected to pose a threat to the United States.Quintana Roo includes the resort towns of Cancun and Cozumel Yucatan Peninsula residents advised not to let their guards downRina is expected to skim the east coast of the Yucatan PeninsulaThe storm is not expected to hit the United StatesAre you there? Tell us about it.
Cancun, Mexico (CNN) -- A weakened Hurricane Rina trudged toward Mexico's popular tourist beaches early Thursday, sending coastal residents fleeing inland.
Once a powerful Category 3 storm, Rina is expected to skim the east coast of the Yucatan Peninsula Thursday night and into Friday, forecasters said.
"The weather is favoring us," said Juan Gabriel Granados, operations director for Quintana Roo civil protection in Chetumal, about the storm's weakened strength. "Everything is normal."
Quintana Roo includes the resort towns of Cancun and Cozumel.
Still, people from the islands of Holbox and Mujeres were being evacuated, he said. About 50,000 coastal residents whose housing was considered "vulnerable" have moved inland to stay with relatives or friends, he said.
Alcohol sales were banned as of 7 p.m. Wednesday; transportation to Cozumel had been banned since 5 p.m., he added.
"We're meeting every six hours with officials at the state and municipal levels to assess the situation," he said.
Beach-front businesses in Playa del Carmen boarded up ahead of the storm, as surfers took advantage of the choppy seas, according to CNN iReporter Guillermo Camarena.
"They need to get their preparations done now; they cannot let their guard down at all," said Dennis Feltgen, a spokesman for the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
Tropical storm force winds were already evident along the east coast of Yucatan, Feltgen said. Those conditions are expected to spread northward overnight.
But it will not make landfall on U.S. soil, dying out instead over Cuba, Feltgen predicted. "In five days, we've got it as a tropical depression over western Cuba on its way down," he said. "It's just going to get sheared apart."
As of 2 a.m. ET, the storm was packing maximum sustained winds near 85 mph (140 kph) with higher gusts and was centered about 120 miles (195 kilometers) south of Cozumel and about 110 miles (175 kilometers) east of Chetumal, the National Hurricane Center said. Rina was moving to the northwest near 6 mph (9 kph).
"A gradual turn to the north with a slight increase in forward speed is expected today," the hurricane center said.
Rina will likely drop 6 to 10 inches of rain over the eastern Yucatan Peninsula and Cozumel through Friday, with isolated amounts of up to 14 inches, the center said.
A storm surge of as much as 2 to 4 feet above normal tide levels along the coast is expected.
CNN's Ed Payne, Tom Watkins, Catherine E. Shoichet, Dana Ford and journalist Brisa Munoz of CNNMexico.com contributed to this report.
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