16 dead in Mexico after Tropical Storm Arlene

At least 16 people have been confirmed dead Sunday in Mexico after Tropical Storm Arlene drenched much of the country with heavy rains and left hundreds of thousands homeless. State officials raised the toll by five after more bodies were discovered swept away by raging rivers in northern town of San Luis Potosi, and a landslide buried a taxi cab in the Oaxaca, killing one woman. In Veracruz, civil protection authorities also confirmed Sunday the death of a first responder working to secure the area swamped by flooding. The first named storm of the Atlantic season barreled ashore along Mexico's Gulf coast on Thursday, dumping several centimeters (inches) of rain in areas still recovering from last year's wettest season on record. The dead also included five people who died overnight Friday and early Saturday in central Hidalgo state, where swollen rivers burst their banks and forced more than 1,000 people to evacuate their homes, according to Civil Protection force director Miguel Garcia. In the central state of Puebla, a woman was crushed to death when a tree collapsed on her house, while in the neighboring state of Veracruz one person was killed when a mudslide buried their home. Ten people were wounded in that incident. In central San Luis Potosi state, a 19 year-old boy drowned when he was swept away by a river as he worked in the field. Two people died in northeastern Tamaulipas state, including a bricklayer who was struck by a live electrical cable that snapped in strong winds. Much of the country was subjected to the foul weather, including the capital Mexico City and its outskirts, where a child's death Friday was blamed on the storm, and the Pacific coastal resort city of Acapulco. Some 278,000 people were left homeless or otherwise impacted by the storm, according to provisional tallies.