According to the US National Hurricane Center, Polo regained maximum Category 5 strength before expected weakening begins, and while the storm is not forecast to make landfall, its severe impacts are already taking a heavy toll.

In Lázaro Cárdenas, Michoacán, desperate residents and business owners have scrambled to stack sandbags as pounding surf breaches coastal defenses, cracking building facades and destroying hotel swimming pools.

Forecasts warn of sustained winds up to 90 kilometres per hour and towering waves reaching six to eight metres high across Colima, Guerrero, Jalisco, Nayarit, and Michoacán. Civil protection authorities have urged residents in high-risk flood and landslide zones to exercise extreme caution as an intensified hurricane season, fueled by the El Nino weather pattern, continues to batter Mexico's coastline.