Hurricane Otis made landfall directly on Acapulco, Mexico, as a violent Category 5 storm on Wednesday, killing at least 27 people and causing extensive damage to the beach resort city.
The big picture: The storm and the flooding it brought with it knocked out electricity and communications for thousands of Acapulco's 780,000 residents, sheared walls from buildings, blew out windows and set off landslides that blocked the city's main highway.
The damage and death toll are becoming clearer in Acapulco, where Category 5 Hurricane Otis struck early Wednesday.
Why it matters: The hurricane is likely to be one of the most expensive extreme weather disasters in Mexico's history, and its unexpected and explosive intensification through landfall is causing some soul-searching in the risk management community, as it is in meteorology circles.
A milestone in electric aviation took place Thursday afternoon, when Beta Technologies landed its ALIA eVTOL aircraft at Duke Field, at Eglin Air Force Base, for a deployment period with the U.S. Air Force.
The big picture: During its 2,000-mile journey from Burlington, Vermont, to Florida, the plane completed multiple short and long distance legs.
The big picture: With electricity and communications still out in the Mexican resort city, reports are slowly coming in of the severe damage to the resort city.