The devastating impacts of Hurricane Melissa proceed to be felt after the record-breaking storm, which first hit Jamaica, then tore via Cuba and Haiti on Wednesday, left greater than two dozen folks lifeless and 18 lacking throughout the Caribbean, based on The Related Press.
The Class 5 storm, with winds approaching 300 kilometres per hour when it made landfall in Jamaica on Tuesday, devastated properties, flooded roads, uprooted bushes and toppled energy strains earlier than transferring on to jap Cuba, the place the complete extent of the harm remains to be being assessed and 735,000 folks stay in shelters, based on officers.
Regardless of weakening between hitting Jamaica on Tuesday and arriving in Cuba on Wednesday, the storm scattered roofs and flooded properties within the nation’s second-largest metropolis, Santiago de Cuba, leaving mountain roads blocked and downed energy strains in its wake.
Males experience after the passage of Hurricane Melissa in El Cobre, Cuba, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025.
AP Photograph / RamÛn Espinosa
Essentially the most important destruction was concentrated within the southwest and northwest of the island, the AP reported.
“That was hell. All night time lengthy, it was horrible,” Reinaldo Charon in Santiago de Cuba instructed the outlet.
Get each day Nationwide information
Get the day’s high information, political, financial, and present affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox as soon as a day.
Information from the UN assist co-ordination workplace (OCHA) discovered that Melissa ranked among the many most intense storms to hit Cuba in many years, with winds reaching practically 222 km/h and rainfall totals exceeding 145 millimetres over a two-day interval.
In the meantime, in Haiti, at the least 25 folks have died and 18 are lacking on account of the storm, the nation’s Civil Safety Company stated in a press release Wednesday, based on the AP.
Individuals keep inside a shelter for households displaced by gang violence, flooded by rain introduced by Hurricane Melissa, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025.
AP Photograph/Odelyn Joseph
Twenty of these reported lifeless in Haiti and 10 of the lacking are from a southern coastal city the place flooding collapsed dozens of properties.
At the very least eight are lifeless in Jamaica, based on the AP.
Within the parish of St. Elizabeth, police Supt. Coleridge Minto instructed Nationwide Information Community on Wednesday that authorities had recovered at the least 4 our bodies in southwest Jamaica.
One dying was reported within the west when a tree fell on a child, state minister Abka Fitz-Henley instructed Nationwide Information Community.
On Thursday, greater than 13,000 folks have been in shelters, based on officers.
Nevertheless, it’s nonetheless too early to find out the extent of the harm as a result of energy outages and the hazardous situations that persist within the area, Dana Morris Dixon, Jamaica’s training minister, stated.
“Restoration will take time, however the authorities is absolutely mobilized,” Prime Minister Andrew Holness instructed the AP in a press release.
“Reduction provides are being ready, and we’re doing the whole lot potential to revive normalcy shortly.”
Black River, in Jamaica’s southwestern parish of St. Elizabeth, is struggling “catastrophic” harm, based on its mayor, Richard Solomon, who stated that was a “delicate time period primarily based on what they’re observing.”
Residents stroll via Santa Cruz, Jamaica, on Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025, after Hurricane Melissa handed.
AP Photograph / Matias Delacroix
The parish’s emergency companies have been unable to reply calls because of the demolition of its infrastructure, Solomon defined. Nonetheless, assist is on its approach.
Jamaican Transportation Minister Daryl Vaz stated two of the island’s airports will open on Wednesday to obtain emergency reduction flights solely, as UN businesses and worldwide governments start flying in provides.
“The devastation is gigantic,” Vaz stated. “We’d like all palms on deck to get better stronger and to assist these in want right now.”
On Wednesday, the UN allotted US$4 million every to Haiti and Cuba from its Central Emergency Fund.
On Thursday, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio introduced on X that the U.S. is sending emergency response groups to help in restoration efforts within the Caribbean, together with Cuba.
Specialists say Melissa, now a Class 2 hurricane, is predicted to deliver harmful winds, flooding and storm surges to the Bahamas on Thursday, adopted by Bermuda.
Earlier than landfall, Melissa had already been blamed for 3 deaths in Jamaica, three in Haiti and one within the Dominican Republic.
— with recordsdata from The Related Press
© 2025 International Information, a division of Corus Leisure Inc.
