Richard had top sustained winds of 70 miles per hour and would likely barrel through southern Mexico and emerge in Mexico's oil-rich Bay of Campeche on Tuesday as a tropical depression.
Tropical storm Richard was gaining strength on Saturday as it dumped rain on Honduras and was seen becoming a hurricane before hitting Belize and Mexico's Yucatan peninsula later in the weekend.
Richard had top sustained winds of 70 miles per hour (110kph) and would likely barrel through southern Mexico and emerge in Mexico's oil-rich Bay of Campeche on Tuesday as a tropical depression, the US National Hurricane Centre said.
At 11pm EDT (0300 GMT Sunday), the storm was about 150miles (240 km) east of the Honduran port city of La Ceiba after brushing past the remote Miskito coast region where indigenous groups live in wooden houses along rivers vulnerable to flooding.
The hurricane centre said the storm was a relatively small tropical cyclone, but becoming better organised.
Richard, the 17th named storm in the Atlantic this year, might eventually veer north toward US oil and natural gas production facilities in the Gulf of Mexico, according to forecasts by some computer weather models.
Honduran authorities said they were evacuating residents and tourists from several coastal areas.
"(We will) evacuate between 3,000 and 4,000 people that live in coastal zones where there could be a storm surge and heavy winds," said Randolfo Funez, an emergency response official.
Richard was moving west-northwest at 7 mph (11kph) and was expected to pass near the northern coast of Honduras on Saturday night before striking Belize and southeastern Mexico late on Sunday, the Miami-based hurricane center said. Honduras and Belize issued hurricane warnings, and Mexico started evacuating fishermen on the Yucatan peninsula.
"Richard is expected to become a hurricane on Sunday," the hurricane centre said.
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