Live Updates: Hurricane Melissa, With Catastrophic Winds, Makes Landfall in Jamaica

Hurricane Melissa has made landfall near New Hope on Jamaica’s southwestern coast as a Category 5 storm, bringing violent winds and significant risks for flash flooding from rain and storm surge as its pushes across the island throughout Tuesday.

The hurricane had wind speeds of 185 m.p.h. when it made landfall at noon local time. But it was the storm’s creeping pace that raised fears among forecasters and government officials that saturating rains could set off flash flooding in narrow river valleys and cause deadly landslides in Jamaica’s steep, mountainous topography.

The scale of the damage and any potential loss of life caused by the hurricane is expected to be difficult to immediately ascertain because of widespread power outages and damages to infrastructure in Jamaica. Roads and bridges in several neighborhoods — including in the parish of St. Elizabeth, which was expected to be heavily hit — have become impassable, local media reported.

Hurricane Melissa is the fourth of this year’s five Atlantic hurricanes to undergo what hurricane experts call “rapid intensification.” Because of climate change, more storms are explosively gaining strength as hurricanes pick up more energy from ocean water that is warmer than before.

The ocean has been overwhelmed with marine heat waves and record breaking temperatures over the last several years. The waters where Hurricane Melissa ramped up into a Category 5 storm during last weekend were 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than the long-term average. You can read more about how Melissa doubled its speed in less than a day.

The administrative block at the Black River Hospital in the southwestern parish of St. Elizabeth lost its roof, but patients and workers have not been affected, Christopher Tufton, the country’s health minister, told The Gleaner newspaper. About 75 patients were moved to higher floors at the facility.

Hurricane Melissa’s interaction with land has weakened the storm to 165 miles per hour as it crosses Jamaica. Wind gusts, especially in the mountains, are likely much higher. The storm’s core will continue moving across the island over the next several hours before re-entering the Caribbean Sea on the north side of the country.

Hurricane Melissa continued to march slowly, moving at 8 m.p.h. — a pace easily bested by a casual cyclist.

Colin Bogle, a Mercy Corps worker sheltering in Portmore, Jamaica, said the storm had knocked out power. “Outside, trees are being violently tossed in the wind, and the noise is relentless. People are anxious and just trying to hold on until the storm passes,” he said.

Verona Sharma, who lives in St. Catherine Parish in southeast Jamaica, said the storm lifted a section of her roofing and her yard was filling up with water. She prepared for the hurricane by cutting down a tree hanging over her house, placing blocks on her metal roof and filling empty bottles and drums with clean water.

Hurricane Melissa is just the second Atlantic storm to ever make landfall with estimated winds of 185 m.p.h. The only other storm to reach that wind speed at landfall occurred before storms were officially named and was known as the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935. That storm tore through the Florida Keys, killing hundreds and causing widespread destruction.

Hurricane Melissa made landfall on Tuesday afternoon as a powerful Category 5 storm, with sustained winds of 185 m.p.h.

Melissa is the strongest hurricane of the 2025 Atlantic season to date — and has now become the most powerful to strike Jamaica since tropical records began for the Atlantic basin.

Michael Brennan, the director of the National Hurricane Center, said that the northern portion of Hurricane Melissa’s eye was starting to move into western Jamaica. He added that “a very dangerous scenario” was expected in the next few hours as the storm moved across the island, carrying catastrophic wind gusts that could reach over 200 m.p.h.

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Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center said Melissa’s eye was approaching the southern coast of Jamaica and warned residents to remain sheltered, even in the calm center of the storm. Dangerous winds will quickly return when the other side of the eye passes.

The majority of hospitals in Jamaica continued to have power, while a few others were relying on generators, Daryl Vaz, the country’s minister of energy and transportation, said at a news conference. “There is no plan at this point to shut down the grid,” he added.

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The U.S. Air Force released photographs of a flight into the storm from Monday. The crew made a pass through the storm to collect vital weather data for the National Hurricane Center.

The northern edge of the eye wall, with some of the storm’s most violent winds, was seen moving ashore on satellite imagery, indicating landfall would likely be soon.

Dana Morris Dixon, Jamaica’s minister of education, said during a news conference that there were 25,000 tourists currently in the country. She added that the authorities were coordinating with hotels to ensure their safety.

Landfall occurs when the center of a hurricane — specifically the center of the eye of the storm — reaches shore. The eyewall, which encircles the eye and packs the storm’s strongest winds, will reach land first. And while that’s a significant and potentially dangerous moment, it’s not officially landfall.

Residents at the U.S. Navy base at Guantánamo Bay were ordered to move into shelters on Tuesday, ahead of Hurricane Melissa’s expected arrival. The installation’s community gym and the recently built K-12 school were serving as two major shelters for many of the remaining 3,000 residents on the base. Melissa is expected to hit Jamaica in the next few hours and then move across southeastern Cuba as an “extremely dangerous major hurricane.”

Those headed to shelters were told to bring their own bedding and a three-day supply of ready-to-eat food and water in small coolers. The community’s cats and dogs were being sheltered at a separate site. National Guard troops assigned to the prison for the 15 wartime detainees held there also have separate, recently built facilities.

The base has evacuated about 1,000 nonessential residents.

Desmond McKenzie, Jamaica’s minister of local government who has been coordinating the country’s disaster management response, issued a stern warning to people on Tuesday.

“Jamaica, this is not the time to be brave,” he said during a news conference. “Don’t bet against Melissa. It is a bet we can’t win.”

Shelters across Jamaica are still largely empty, he added, despite mandatory evacuation orders urging people to seek refuge. Of the 800 shelters that authorities have set up, less than half of those are occupied, with a total of about 6,000 people.

“There is still a small window of opportunity,” McKenzie said. “Let us see if we can use it wisely.”

After he finished speaking, a power outage interrupted the live stream.

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When a hurricane hunter flight abandoned its mission during Hurricane Melissa on Monday, it underscored how forecasters cannot afford to lose the data such aircraft collect, said Frank Marks, who retired last year as director of the hurricane research division at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory.

The plane, a WP-3D Orion turboprop known as Kermit and operated by NOAA, experienced severe turbulence shortly after measuring wind speeds of 165 miles per hour. Marks said the last time a flight was aborted was in 2022, during Hurricane Ian. “It’s got to fly again in the next few hours,” Marks said.

The National Hurricane Center said in its latest update that the core of Melissa was expected to make landfall on Jamaica “during the next couple of hours.” Melissa was still a Category 5 storm with winds of 185 miles per hour. The center said “little change” in strength was expected before landfall. After that, it was expected to move across southeastern Cuba early Wednesday, still as an “extremely dangerous major hurricane.”

Jamaica’s main power provider said that a little over a third of its customers were without power at 8 a.m. on Tuesday. Hugh Grant, president of Jamaica Public Service, said that most of those are in the southern parishes of St Elizabeth, Manchester and Hanover, as well St James, in the west.

The residents in Westmoreland, a southwestern Jamaican parish, were in the general path of Hurricane Melissa. But Brian Briscoe, a 35-year-old chemical engineer, chose not to evacuate. “My house is sturdy. I don’t have many trees,” he said Tuesday from his community, which is about five miles from the nearest coastline. He said electricity went out at about 2 a.m. and hasn’t come back. “The trees are swaying really hard,” he said. “We have been getting light rain continuously.”

Hurricane Melissa is only hours from landfall and is poised to deliver a worst-case scenario combination of hazards when it hits Jamaica. The Category 5 storm’s attributes are comparable to some of the most destructive hurricanes in recent history, including Hurricane Katrina:

• Intensity: Melissa’s sustained winds of 185 m.p.h. are more potent than the winds during Hurricane Katrina’s maximum intensity, which were 175 m.p.h. before weakening slightly. Melissa’s winds are more intense than those during the peak strength of Hurricane Maria, which weakened to a Category 4 hurricane with 155 m.p.h. winds as it scraped across the island. Melissa’s minimum central pressure has been measured at a staggering 892 millibars. Melissa’s recording in this key measure of intensity is stronger than Katrina’s peak strength in 2005 and it is the fifth-strongest minimum central pressure ever recorded inside an Atlantic storm.

• Rainfall: Melissa’s slow forward motion is similar to that of Hurricane Harvey in 2017. That hurricane stalled over Texas and dumped more than 60 inches of rain in some areas. This pace ensures prolonged, potentially record-breaking rainfall over Jamaica. It is also reminiscent of Hurricane Dorian, which parked over the Bahamas for days, releasing up to 30 inches of rain, according to NASA. This rainfall, combined with storm surge, produced flooding that reached the second floor of homes in parts of the island chain.

• Flash flooding and landslides: Jamaica’s steep, mountainous topography is similar to that of North Carolina’s mountains. In such terrain, slow-moving rain events like the remnants of Hurricane Helene, which wiped buildings off their foundation in 2024, can turn catastrophic, triggering flash flooding in narrow river valleys and causing destructive landslides.

Hurricane Melissa’s destructive winds could be significantly stronger in Jamaica’s mountains, which cover nearly half the country, than at sea level when the storm hits the island on Tuesday.

The hurricane had a maximum sustained wind speed of 185 miles per hour early Tuesday, the National Hurricane Center said. But winds could be as much as 30 percent stronger in the hills and mountains, and will likely destroy structures and fell trees, power poles and most homes.