Mohave Daily News: Nation

McALLEN, Texas - Residents along the Texas-Mexico border kept a watchful eye on Tropical Storm Dolly on Monday, stocking up on plywood, generators and flashlights as forecasters predicted the storm would strengthen into a hurricane later this week and make landfall.

The storm was expected to bring high winds and dump 10 to 20 inches of rain in coastal areas near the U.S.-Mexican border. Emergency officials feared major flooding problems and urged coastal residents to prepare.

Shell Oil said it was evacuating workers from oil rigs in the western Gulf Of Mexico, and the federal government was trying to decide whether they could begin construction on a new border fence, which was to be combined with levee improvements along the Rio Grande in Hidalgo County.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami issued a hurricane watch from Brownsville north to Port O'Connor.

Mexico also announced a hurricane watch from Rio San Fernando north to Matamoros and the U.S. border. Dolly was expected to make landfall Wednesday as a Category 1 storm with sustained winds of 74 mph to 95 mph.

Texas officials said they wouldn't order evacuations along the coast unless Dolly strengthens to a Category 3, with sustained winds of at least 96 mph.

At 2 p.m. EDT, the center of Tropical Storm Dolly was located about 475 miles east-southeast of the lower Rio Grande Valley. Mexico discontinued its tropical storm warning for the Yucatan peninsula, which was battered by strong winds and drenched with rain a day earlier.

Dolly was moving toward the west-northwest at 18 mph. The storm was expected to gradually slow in the next couple days but stay on track toward the U.S.-Mexico border. Maximum sustained winds were 50 mph but were expected to strengthen Tuesday to hurricane force, which would mean at least 74 mph.

Gov. Rick Perry activated 1,200 National Guard troops and other emergency crews. Mindful of the disastrous evacuation before Hurricane Rita hit the Texas Gulf Coast in 2005 - when far more people died from heat-related injuries and auto accidents fleeing the storm than from the severe weather - Perry also ordered 250 buses to be staged in San Antonio. The governor also ordered fuel teams to be ready to keep gas stations supplied and to help stranded motorists.

There are about 2 million people in the Rio Grande Valley, which includes popular summer beach resort South Padre Island.