Hotels

What Hurricane Polo Taught Us in Los Cabos

By Fernando Loría — Chief Executive Officer, Hurricane Solution · October 7, 2026

Polo reached Category 5 in the Pacific and, based on its central pressure, went into the record books as the second most intense hurricane in the eastern Pacific, behind only Patricia. For a couple of days, a lot of people in Los Cabos were thinking about Odile. In the end, Polo made landfall as a Category 2 near Las Barrancas, in Comondú, about 320 km (200 miles) north of Cabo San Lucas, and the tourist corridor woke up to rain, downed branches and high seas, but no widespread structural damage.

Los Cabos got lucky, and I think we should say so plainly. I also think the week left behind very useful information for hotels and homeowners, especially now that Rachel is sending swells toward the peninsula.

In this article I cover:

What actually happened with Polo in Los Cabos, without exaggerating or downplaying it.
Why it pays to inspect even if the property looks untouched.
What to check, in what order, and why to start with the anchors.
What hotels should fix before their next deployment.

What happened, by the numbers

Based on the information available as of September 30:

Polo underwent extreme rapid intensification and reached Category 5 off the coast of Mexico.
It made landfall as a Category 2, with winds of about 175 km/h (109 mph), around midnight near Las Barrancas, Comondú.
Los Cabos saw overcast skies, scattered rain, brief gusts and heavy surf. Roads stayed passable and power held in the tourist areas.
Governor Víctor Castro said Polo brought more rain than wind damage, and state Civil Protection reported no casualties statewide.
Mexico's Defense Ministry (Sedena) deployed 1,200 troops across Comondú, La Paz and Los Cabos.
Rachel, to the south, is now moving away from the mainland, but the National Hurricane Center warns that its swells will reach the peninsula through the weekend.

The full damage assessment is still under way in Comondú and other areas. In Los Cabos, what people experienced was a massive hurricane passing close by.

A near miss works as a drill

Hundreds of hotels and homes in Los Cabos deployed their protection for Polo and took it down days later without ever taking the core of the storm. It's easy to pack everything away and forget about it until the next advisory. I'd look at it differently: it was a real-world drill that has already been paid for in staff hours, and the information it produced is only useful if someone writes it down.

These are the questions I'd ask any team this week:

How long did it take us to deploy everything, start to finish?
Which pieces couldn't we find, or didn't we know where they went?
Which screws wouldn't go in, or got stripped?
Which part of the building took the longest, and why?
Who did the work, and which of those people won't be here next time?

Why inspect if nothing happened

There are four reasons a property that came through Polo intact still needs an inspection.

Deployment causes wear. Putting protection up and taking it down subjects anchors, screws and fabric to stresses they don't see the rest of the year. A forced thread or an edge that rubbed against a frame stays behind as a weak point.

Salt works quietly. Salt left on tracks and anchors starts corroding them within weeks if it isn't rinsed off with fresh water.

The sea did come in high. Beach-level terraces, retaining walls, pools and access paths can have scour damage that isn't visible from above.

The season isn't over. The Pacific season doesn't close until November 30, and Rachel is already sending swells this very week.

The lesson of Odile

In Los Cabos, nobody needs to be told why this matters. In September 2014, Odile made landfall at the southern tip of the peninsula as a Category 3, causing major damage to hotels and resorts. The Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) reported at the time the worst damage to the power grid in its history, with close to 98% of Baja California Sur's population losing power at some point.

During Odile, a number of hotels and homes that had our systems were protected as expected. When I look at why, the answer always has three parts: the system was complete, it was properly anchored, and the staff knew how to install it. None of those three things maintains itself between one hurricane and the next, and inspection is what keeps them in place.

What to check, from the outside in

This is the list I'd use at a hotel or a home in Los Cabos after Polo:

Anchors. Corrosion, cracks in the surrounding concrete or stone, loose or rotated pieces, damaged threads. An anchor that moves when you touch it gets replaced.
Screws and hardware. Count them against the original inventory and replace any that are stripped or rusted.
Storm fabric panels and mesh. Lay them out and look for cuts, punctures and wear along the edges and at the attachment points.
Rolling shutters and metal panels. Bent tracks, guides and locks.
Impact glass. Look for cracking even if the glass is still holding. It protected the interior, but its capacity to take the next impact may be reduced.
Frames and seals. Stains below windows, swollen wood floors, rust on interior hardware.
Roof edges. Parapets, copings and the joint between roof and façade, which is where wind lifts first.
Drains. Sand, leaves and salt in the drains on terraces, rooftops and pool decks.
Interiors. Ceilings, carpets and closets in ocean-facing rooms, because in this heat hidden moisture turns into mold within a few weeks.
Dated photos of everything, even where there's no damage.

I start with the anchors for a practical reason. When a protection system fails in a hurricane, the fabric almost never tears in the middle. What usually fails is an anchor that pulled out, a screw that stripped or an edge that wore through. The best fabric on the market is only as good as the point holding it.

What hotels should fix

Here's a case that helps make the point (illustrative, no names). Two hotels on the corridor deployed for Polo, and neither had any damage.

The first took everything down methodically. It washed each piece, let it dry, checked the anchors, replaced the damaged screws, updated the inventory and noted that the tallest building took longer because it was short a ladder. It bought the ladder.
The second took everything down in a hurry because guests wanted their view back. It stored the pieces wet, sandy and unlabeled in a shared warehouse, and nobody checked the anchors.

If another advisory comes, the first hotel knows how long it will take. The second is going to find moldy fabric panels, rusted screws and pieces nobody knows where to put. That's why I believe the best indicator of a hurricane plan is a second deployment of the season that's faster than the first.

The fixes with the most impact:

Label every piece with building, floor, room and opening.
Store each piece of protection close to where it's installed. At a 2,500-room hotel, we designed storage at the top of each balcony, with the fabric panel rolled up and anchored overhead, so it deploys in about 3 to 5 minutes per room.
Restock consumables after every use: screws, tools, ladders, safety equipment.
Train new staff and keep a written manual, because maintenance teams turn over.

Checklist: questions for your team or your supplier

Did anyone check the anchors after the protection came down?
Were the pieces stored washed, dry and labeled?
Is there cracked impact glass we haven't spotted because it's on upper floors?
Do we know how long the Polo deployment took us and what slowed it down?
Which openings were left unprotected because we had no way to cover them?
Is our system certified for impact, at what level, and under what file number?

In summary

Polo was an exceptional hurricane, but it made landfall about 320 km north of Los Cabos, and the corridor had no widespread structural damage.
Any system that was deployed and taken down needs an inspection, because deployment causes wear and salt corrodes.
The inspection should start with the anchors, which is where systems tend to fail.
Odile showed in 2014 what happens when the core does arrive, and the protection that worked then was complete, anchored and in the hands of trained staff.
A well-prepared hotel makes its second deployment faster than its first.

Rachel will pass south of the peninsula in the coming days, and the season has two more months to run. What I'd do in Los Cabos this week is check the anchors, wash and label everything that was used for Polo, and write down how long the team took. It's a few days of work, and it's the cheapest way to be better prepared for the next system.