Bad weather keeps Mexico oil ports shut

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico kept its main crude oil exporting ports closed on Thursday due to bad weather that hit earlier in the week, the transport ministry said.

The Gulf of Mexico ports of Dos Bocas, Cayo Arcas and Coatzacoalcos, which together ship some 80 percent of Mexico's oil exports, remained shut, along with the Pacific Coast oil port of Salina Cruz, the ministry said in an afternoon weather update.

The closures mean some shipments have now been delayed for two days, although Pemex said all cargoes held at dock would be sent out as soon as the ports reopen.

Authorities had begun closing around a dozen commercial ports from Tuesday, but several reopened on Thursday, including the smaller Gulf Coast oil ports of Ciudad Madero, part of Tampico, and Altamira.

Earlier, a spokeswoman at state-owned oil monopoly Pemex said the weather was improving and the company hoped bigger oil ports would be operating again on Friday.

Mexico is the world's No. 9 exporter of crude oil, shipping an average of 1.7 million barrels per day in 2007, and a top-three supplier to the United States, which buys roughly 80 percent of Mexican exported oil.

Pemex's exports have been repeatedly disrupted in recent months by bad weather that has halted shipments for days at a time and in some cases triggered oil rig evacuations.

Thursday's bad weather was part of a cold snap that has buffeted the Pacific and Gulf coasts with strong winds and sprinkled parts of Mexico with snow and frost as temperatures hit some of the lowest levels in recent history.

(Reporting by Catherine Bremer; Editing by David Gregorio)