As Hurricane Melissa winds its way towards the Caribbean island in a record-breaking hurricane, officials in Jamaica have urged residents to stay inside their shelters.
The island will be surrounded by St. Ann Parish in the north on Tuesday morning, according to forecasters.
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The Jamaican prime minister, Andrew Holness, made an appeal to the public to remain inside.
I ask Jamaicans to remain inside their homes and stay there. Avoid unnecessary travel. He said late on Monday that flash floods, heavy rain, and strong winds could strike at any time.
He continued, “The safer option is to stay indoors, which lessens the burden on our security and emergency personnel.”
In this disaster, I’m confident that our security forces have the necessary resources to keep the law and order in place. We must protect both our communities and those affected by such events because there are always people who might be against the good of the community.
Our security picture twitter.com/He0yyB24hZ
Holness then issued a warning about massive destruction.
He said that the region’s infrastructure cannot support a Category 5 storm, which would be the strongest on the Saffir-Simpson scale. The key is now: how quickly things recover. That’s the difficulty.
“Catastrophic” winds and flooding
Seven deaths have already been brought on by the storm in the Caribbean, with three in Jamaica, three in Haiti, and one in the Dominican Republic, where one more person is still missing.
Late on Monday, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) announced that Melissa was still 240 kilometers (150 miles) southwest of Kingston and had a maximum wind speed of 282 km/h (175 mph) at that time.
On Tuesday, the storm was forecast to bring “catastrophic winds, flooding, and storm surge” to Jamaica.
Before landfall, officials warned of a life-threatening storm surge of up to 4 meters (13 feet) across southern Jamaica, along with reports of numerous power outages, fallen trees, and landslides.
Jamaica’s local government and community development minister Desmond McKenzie stated to Al Jazeera that the country had done everything in its power to prepare.
We have done everything possible to evacuate people from our shelters, get people to their homes, provide the necessary resources, and clean our drains. He said from Kingston, “We have been cleaning our gulleys.”
“We have completed the mitigation exercises. He said that we have conducted public education, and that it will be interesting to see how Melissa will turn out.
According to McKenzie, 881 shelters have been established nationwide.
“I have to be honest that not everyone has a shelter host. The number of people showing up at the shelters has increased. He claimed that some parishes have a higher demand than others.
I’m not moving, I promise.
Numerous residents said they were staying put despite the pleas to evacuate.
“I’m not moving,” I said. Roy Brown, a resident of Kingston’s seaside community of Port Royal, said, “I don’t think I can run from death.”
Due to his previous encounters with the subpar conditions of government hurricane shelters, the plumber and tiler said he was reluctant to flee.
Some residents of St Elizabeth’s Flagaman farming community were lounging around in a store.
Enrico Coke, the owner, claimed he opened his business out of concern that his neighbors would not be able to get anywhere.
“Farmers are important to me. He told AFP that the fishermen will experience pain as a result. “We’ll need assistance as soon as possible, especially in terms of water,” the statement read.
Despite the government’s directive to evacuate flood-prone communities, Mercy Corps adviser Colin Bogle said the majority of families are staying in place.
He told The Associated Press news agency, “Many have never experienced anything like this before, and the uncertainty is frightening.” There is a deep fear of displacement, injury, and loss of one’s homes and livelihoods.
At only 5 km/h (3 mph), meteorologists claim Melissa packs a punch due to its slow pace: It moves at a slower rate than most people walk.
That leaves much longer than the majority of hurricanes in the areas in its path for punishing conditions.
Changes in climate
On Tuesday night, Melissa is expected to cross over eastern Cuba after beating up Jamaica.
Granma, Santiago de Cuba, Guantanamo, and the provinces of Guantanamo and Holguin were all subject to a hurricane warning, while Las Tunas were also subject to a tropical storm warning.
Parts of Cuba were forecast to experience up to 510mm (20 inches) of rain, along with a significant storm surge along the coast.
More than 600,000 people from the area, including Santiago, the island’s second-largest city, were being evacuated by Cuban officials on Monday.
The southeast and central Bahamas were also subject to a hurricane warning, and the Turks and Caicos Islands were also warned about tropical storms.
Meteorologist Kerry Emanuel claimed that more storms were intensifying rapidly than Melissa, which would increase the possibility of significant rains.
He told AFP that “water kills a lot more people than wind.”
Beryl, a particularly strong storm for the time of year, was the last major hurricane to make an impact on Jamaica in July 2024.
Source: Aljazeera
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