Hurricane Melissa is bearing down on Jamaica and other parts of the Caribbean as a top-level Category 5 storm, with forecasters predicting catastrophic flooding and urging residents to seek shelter immediately. Photo / RAMMB, CIRA, AFP
Hurricane Melissa is bearing down on Jamaica and other parts of the Caribbean as a top-level Category 5 storm, with forecasters predicting catastrophic flooding and urging residents to seek shelter immediately. Photo / RAMMB, CIRA, AFP
Brutal winds and heavy rains have lashed Jamaica before Hurricane Melissa unleashes what the Prime Minister warned could be a massively destructive storm – the island’s most violent on record.
Melissa was charting a painstakingly slow path through the Caribbean as a monster Category 5 storm.
It has alreadybeen blamed for at least four deaths in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Its heavy rains combined with intense winds – Melissa’s maximum speeds are 280km/h, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in its latest update – could wreak devastation on the scale of historic hurricanes, including 2017’s Maria or 2005’s Katrina.
Those massive storms, which have grown increasingly common as the climate warms, left indelible impacts on Puerto Rico and the US city of New Orleans.
Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness said the island’s western end faced the worst.
Teenagers gather at the Bank of Jamaica's car park on the Waterfront in Kingston. Photo / Ricardo Makyn / AFP
“I don’t believe there is any infrastructure within this region that could withstand a Category 5 storm, so there could be significant dislocation,” he told CNN.
But despite pleas to evacuate, many residents in Jamaica were staying put.
“I am not moving. I don’t believe I can run from death,” Roy Brown, speaking from the historic seaside area, Port Royal, in Kingston, told AFP.
The plumber and tiler cited poor conditions and bad past experiences at government hurricane shelters for not wanting to flee.
Fisherwoman Jennifer Ramdial echoed that view, also adding: “I just don’t want to leave.”
Holness said evacuation was about “the national good of saving lives”.
“You have been warned. It’s now up to you to use that information to make the right decision,” he said during a briefing.
‘Catastrophic’
Jamaica was expected to see deteriorating conditions through Monday night, with landfall expected early Tuesday (local time).
Part of Melissa’s punch stems from its slow pace: it is lumbering along slower than most people walk, at just 4.8km/h or less.
That means areas in its path could endure punishing conditions for far longer than during most hurricanes.
The NHC warned of “catastrophic” flash flooding, landslides and destructive winds that could cause lengthy power and communications outages, with “extensive infrastructural damage”.
Up to a metre of rainfall was forecast, with deluges expected to bring flash flooding and landslides to Jamaica as well as Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Cuba.
Storm surge was likely along Jamaica’s southern coast, with waters potentially rising some 3.9m, with “destructive waves”.
In the farming community of Flagaman in St Elizabeth, residents hunkered down in a store.
Owner Enrico Coke said he opened his place for fear that his neighbours had nowhere to go: “I’m concerned about farmers, the fishermen will be suffering after this.
“We’ll need help as soon as possible, especially water for the people.”
Dangerous flooding
After pummelling Jamaica, Melissa was forecast to head north and cross over eastern Cuba on Tuesday night, while continuing to bring rain and heavy winds to Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
A 79-year-old man was found dead in the Dominican Republic after being swept away in a stream, officials there said Saturday. A 13-year-old boy was missing.
In Haiti, the civil protection agency reported the deaths of three people in storm conditions.
Meteorologist Kerry Emanuel told AFP a warming climate was causing more storms to rapidly intensify as Melissa did, and especially raises the potential for enormous rains.
“Water kills a lot more people than wind,” he told AFP.
The last major hurricane to impact Jamaica was Beryl in July 2024 – an abnormally strong storm for the time of year.
“Human-caused climate change is making all of the worst aspects of Hurricane Melissa even worse,” said climate scientist Daniel Gilford.
