CNN

Devastating category 5 Hurricane Melissa makes landfall in Jamaica

By CNN

Published October 27, 2025 8:45 pm

CNN, TVJ, COURTESY MATEO AVALLE PIBER, HURRICANE HUNTERS, WPLG

By CNN meteorologists Mary Gilbert, Billy Stockwell, Christian Edwards, and Michael Rios

(CNN) – Hurricane Melissa made landfall around 1 p.m. ET Tuesday near New Hope, Jamaica, as a 185 mph Category 5 storm, according to the National Hurricane Center.

The hurricane’s winds of 185 mph at the moment of landfall make it the strongest storm on record to smash into the country. Melissa is also one of the strongest hurricanes on record to make landfall in the Atlantic basin, tied with only two other storms – 2019’s Dorian and 1935’s Labor Day hurricane.

Melissa is the strongest storm to make landfall anywhere in the Atlantic basin since 2019’s Hurricane Dorian. That storm had winds of 185 mph when it slammed into the Bahamas’ Abaco Islands.

Previously, the strongest storm to make landfall in Jamaica was 1988’s devastating Hurricane Gilbert. That storm was a Category 4 hurricane when it made landfall just west of Kingston.

Forecasters say Melissa will track directly over Jamaica for the next few hours, bringing catastrophic winds, flooding rain and life-threatening storm surge. Its center is currently moving north-northeast at 9 mph.

Catastrophic winds, flash flooding and storm surge are already pummeling the island and those impacts will continue through the afternoon.

Jamaica experienced several power outages under hurricane conditions before Melissa made landfall, said Daryl Vaz, Jamaica’s Minister for Science, Energy, Telecommunications and Transport.

The electricity grid managed by Jamaica Public Service (JPS), the country’s only electricity provider, “has already been impacted by hurricane conditions, which have caused several power outages across the island,” Vaz said Tuesday at a news conference.

Around 35% of JPS customers – some 240,000 people – were without power before landfall, Vaz said.

At least three people died in Jamaica as they were preparing for the approaching hurricane, Minister of Health and Wellness Christopher Tufton said Monday night.

The category five storm has already been blamed for the deaths of three people in Haiti and one person in the Dominican Republic.

The three deaths in Jamaica happened while trees were being cut down. Two of them died after trees fell on top of them, and one person was electrocuted, the minister said without providing details.

Another 13 people have been injured during preparations. Many of them fell off ladders or rooftops, the minister added.

The vice president of US-based non-profit organization United Cajun Navy, Brian Trascher, said conditions are “deteriorating rapidly” as Hurricane Melissa presses in on the island.

“It looks like it’s going to eventually turn back to the north east,” he said, “It’s been very hard to safely pre-position people…like, playing dodge ball,” he added.

Trascher urged residents to brace themselves for the devastation Melissa is likely to bring, adding, “there is no amount of caution they can take that will be too much or overkill…The wind speeds are going to be very traumatic…life threatening.”

“We’re talking about trillions of gallons of water that’s going to be dumped into a mountainous island, and the gravity is going to take that water nowhere but down,” he added.

United Nations staff are preparing to deploy to Cuba and Jamaica this week.

The UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said Monday that it is planning to send in personnel, “as conditions allow, to reinforce coordination and preparedness efforts across the region.”