Hurricane Beta has made landfall in northeast Nicaragua, pounding the country's Caribbean coast with strong winds and heavy rain.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center says Beta hit land Sunday as a category two storm with sustained winds near 175 kilometers per hour.
Forecasters expect Beta to steadily weaken as it moves inland but say it could dump up to 40 centimeters of rain on parts of Nicaragua and eastern Honduras.
Nicaraguan authorities have moved tens of thousands of people into temporary shelters.
Honduras has declared a state of emergency, and has begun evacuating more than 100,00 people from areas prone to flooding and mudslides.
Beta is the 23rd named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, the most in a single year since record-keeping began in 1851.
