Hurricane Melissa began to dissipate on Friday after sowing devastation across much of Jamaica, cutting off communities in Cuba, drenching Haiti and leaving at least 50 dead. It was one of the strongest storms on record to make landfall in the Caribbean,
Melissa was the most powerful storm to hit Jamaica directly, and the first big hurricane to do so since 1988. US forecaster AccuWeather estimated $48 billion (€42 billion) to $52 billion in damage and economic loss across the western Caribbean.
Melissa pounded southwestern Jamaica on Tuesday as a powerful Category 5 hurricane, well above minimum wind speeds for the strongest hurricane classification, and devastated many areas already battered by last year’s Hurricane Beryl.
Jamaica’s information minister confirmed at least 19 deaths on Friday but said there were indications more bodies would be recovered. Some 462,000 people are without power and emergency food distribution has started, she said.
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In Haiti, which was not directly hit but suffered days of torrential rains from the slow-moving storm, authorities reported at least 31 deaths and 20 more missing.
At least 23 people, including 10 children, died in Haiti’s southern town of Petit-Goave when a river burst its banks. The rains also damaged roads, houses and farmland.
“It is a sad moment for the country,” the head of Haiti’s transitional presidential council said. “In addition to the deaths and missing people, there is a lot of material damage: houses have been destroyed, fields flooded, livestock lost and roads cut off.”
Authorities also warned of the risk of cholera, which re-emerged in Haiti in 2022 and spreads via contaminated water.
In Cuba, which Hurricane Melissa struck as a Category 3 hurricane, no deaths were reported as of Friday, although it caused extensive damage to homes, roads and crops. Hundreds of thousands were evacuated from eastern Cuba and around the island’s second-biggest city, Santiago de Cuba.
The hurricane knocked out communications in five of Jamaica’s 14 parishes, said local government minister Desmond McKenzie as he presented an initial assessment of the damage.
“It is not a pretty reading,” he said of the northwestern port town of Falmouth: “The municipal building has been destroyed. The infirmary [was] destroyed. The roads and works department [also] destroyed. The courthouse destroyed, [too].”
Flights carrying humanitarian aid began to land in Jamaica on Thursday, while the country’s military called on reserves to help in relief and rescue efforts.
“The situation on the ground is what can only be described as apocalyptic,” said World Food Programme Caribbean director Brian Bogart after visiting Black River, near where Melissa made landfall in Jamaica. “It appears as if a bomb has gone off in that community and people are still in shock.”
Black River resident Pamella Foster said she was trying to be strong for her grandchildren after she returned to find her home destroyed, its roof, windows and doors torn away and kitchen swept out to sea.
“We will survive,” she said. “But the pain ... It’s just too much.”
US forecaster AccuWeather said Melissa was the third most-intense hurricane observed in the Caribbean, as well as its slowest-moving, compounding the damage across affected areas.
Scientists say hurricanes are intensifying, and with greater frequency, as a result of warming ocean waters caused by greenhouse gas emissions. Many Caribbean leaders have called on wealthy, heavy-polluting nations to provide reparations in the form of aid or debt relief.
As 3pm Irish time on Friday, Melissa was a post-tropical cyclone with maximum sustained winds of 137km/h, heading northeast towards Iceland and the Faroe Islands. – Reuters
