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Gunfire heard near beach in Mexico’s resort city of Cancun

CANCUN, Mexico — Gunfire near a beach in the Mexican resort of Cancun sent tourists scrambling for cover on Tuesday, authorities said.

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The shooting, at the Caribbean coast resort, did not appear to injure anyone, The Associated Press reported. It came about a month after two suspected drug dealers were killed on a beach near the resort town of Puerto Morelos, just south of Cancun, as gunmen from rival gangs staged a shootout near hotels.

In October, Anjali Ryot, a San Jose, California, travel blogger, and Jennifer Henzold, a German tourist, were killed in Tulum, the AP reported.

Lucio Hernández Gutiérrez, the chief of police in the state of Quintana Roo, said the attackers in the latest incident apparently pulled up to the beach on jet skis and opened fire at a beach in Cancun’s hotel zone, according to the AP.

>> 2 killed after rival gangs stage shootout in Mexican resort town

One witness, Rick Lebassa, of Maine, said two or three gunmen appeared to be shooting into the air with pistols, not at the beach.

“There were two guys, and maybe even a third, who came in on jet skis, and what I saw was them shooting up into the sky,” Lebassa told the AP. “I did not see any shots coming in toward the shoreline.”

Zayne Jones, of Midvale, Utah, told KUTV he heard gunfire from his family’s hotel room while his wife and children were at the hotel pool on the beach.

“I ran to the balcony to tell them to get down and get to a corridor and get cover,” Jones told the television station. “There was panic at the resort, people running and yelling.”

Jones said gunmen on jet skis fired approximately 20 shots, according to KUTV.

“Luckily nobody got hurt, but it could have gone a different way,” Jones told the television station. “Just not a good feeling having your kids out here.”

Two tourists from Minnesota, Andy Guyrich and Kerry Arms, said they heard plenty of gunshots and took cover.

“We just had to hit the deck,” Guyrich told the AP.

“There was a delayed reaction for about maybe five seconds, then everybody started scrambling and screaming and crying, and running,” Arms said.