"Tropical storm Dolly lashed Mexico's northeast coast on Tuesday night, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said, bringing torrential rain and life threatening flash floods.

Dolly was blowing maximum sustained winds of 45 miles per hour (72 km per hour), but having made landfall the storm was expected to lose strength by Wednesday evening, NHC said.

Dolly, which formed in the southern Gulf of Mexico early on Tuesday, has already forced the closure of two of Mexico's three major crude oil export terminals."

David Alire Garcia and Gabriel Stargardter report for Reuters September 3, 2014. [2]