Residents, Tourists to Shelters as Hurricane Makes Landfall

Residents and tourists hunkered down in shelters and hotel conference rooms overnight as a powerful and sprawling Hurricane Odile made landfall on the southern Baja California peninsula.

The hurricane brought huge waves, heavy winds and pounding rain to Cabo San Lucas, with landfall occurring at 10:45 p.m. local time.

Christina McFadden says she and her husband had to be rescued by hotel employees after a window blew out in their room, trapping them inside.

"When the glass broke, we hid behind the chair and next to the toilet and then I told my husband, 'I think we need to leave,' because it sounded like the building was falling apart," she told ABC News.

They were later taken to a hotel hurricane shelter.

"We're sweating profusely, it's very hot here," she said. "We're in a room with about 200 people and a lot of people are sleeping or trying to sleep, but I don't know, we're just up."

Wind whipped through the palm trees, an unwelcome sight for vacationers.

The storm's sustained winds were reported at 125 miles per hour Sunday night, a Category 3 storm.

Luis Felipe Puente, national coordinator for Mexico's civil protection agency, said 164 shelters had been prepared for as many as 30,000 people in the state of Baja California Sur.

He said 30,000 tourists, nearly all of them foreigners, were in the area, and could seek refuge in any of the 18 hotels set up as shelters. People were warned to stay inside in the safer areas of hotels and keep away from doors and windows.

Odile is the seventh major hurricane of the Eastern Pacific Hurricane Season.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.