Hurricane Melissa makes landfall as Jamaica's strongest-ever storm

KINGSTON: Hurricane Melissa made landfall in western Jamaica early Tuesday afternoon as a powerful Category 5 storm and the strongest ever to directly hit the Caribbean nation of 2.8 million people.

Melissa made landfall near the town of New Hope, some 62 km (39 miles) south of Montego Bay, packing maximum sustained winds of 185 mph (295 kph), the U.S. National Hurricane Center said in its latest advisory.

The most powerful level on the Saffir-Simpson scale, Category 5, requires speeds of at least 157 mph.

The slow-moving storm is forecast to remain a powerful hurricane as it crosses the mountainous island, whose highland communities are vulnerable to landslides and flooding, and heads towards Santiago de Cuba, Cuba’s second-largest city.

The Miami-based hurricane center warned that “total structural failure” was likely in Melissa’s path.

“The destruction could be unlike anything people in Jamaica have seen before,” said U.S. forecaster AccuWeather’s lead hurricane expert, Alex DaSilva. “The island has never taken a direct hit from a Category 4 or a Category 5 hurricane in recorded history.”

Melissa is the third most intense hurricane observed in the Caribbean after Wilma in 2005 and Gilbert in 1988, according to AccuWeather.

Gilbert was the last major storm to directly hit the island.

Shortly before landfall, Jamaican electric utility JPS said power outages had affected more than a third of its customers. In its worst-hit parishes, some three-quarters of customers lost power, JPS said.

Local Government Minister Desmond McKenzie told reporters that nearly 6,000 people had moved into temporary shelters. The government had issued mandatory evacuation orders for some 28,000 people, but some were reluctant to leave their homes.

“Don’t bet against Melissa, because you will lose,” warned McKenzie, as authorities implored residents to seek protection in shelters and fortify their residences.

“It’s a catastrophic situation,” the World Meteorological Organization’s tropical cyclone specialist Anne-Claire Fontan told a press briefing. “For Jamaica, it will be the storm of the century for sure.”