After the Eye: Jamaica, Cuba and the Wake of Hurricane Melissa
The morning after felt like a country holding its breath. In Kingston, the air was heavy with the scent of salt, soaked plywood and gasoline. Streets that yesterday thrummed with radio DJs and roadside markets were littered with corrugated tin and palm fronds. Mango trees lay broken like discarded umbrellas. Houses that had stood for generations now gaped, their insides exposed to a gray sky.
“It has been a very difficult early morning,” Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel wrote on social media as Melissa battered Cuba’s southern coast, urging people to stay sheltered while officials counted losses. The scene in Jamaica was no less stark. Prime Minister Andrew Holness warned of damaged hospitals, flooded parishes and a long road to recovery: “There will be a lot of work to do,” he told an international broadcaster, reflecting the grim reality on the ground.
The Facts: A Storm of Uncommon Ferocity
Meteorologists say Melissa was not an ordinary hurricane. At its fiercest over Jamaica, Melissa packed sustained winds estimated as high as 297 km/h, a velocity that places it among the most intense Atlantic storms on record. An analysis of NOAA data found that the storm matched the atmospheric pressure recorded in the notorious 1935 Labor Day Hurricane—about 892 millibars—making Melissa one of a tiny number of storms to reach such depths of pressure.
The Miami-based National Hurricane Center (NHC) reported Melissa weakened to a still-dangerous Category 3 as it moved into Cuban territory, but the imprint left in Jamaica—especially in parishes such as St Elizabeth—was immediate and devastating. Officials said more than 500,000 residents were without power and entire coastal districts were “underwater.”
AccuWeather ranked Melissa as the third most intense hurricane observed in the Caribbean in modern records, behind Wilma (2005) and Gilbert (1988). The World Meteorological Organization issued a stark warning of storm surges up to 4 meters, a reality that in low-lying coastal zones quickly becomes lethal.
Numbers that Matter
- Estimated evacuations in eastern Cuba: ~735,000 people
- People ordered to move to higher ground in Cuba: ~500,000
- Jamaicans reported without power in some areas: >500,000
- Tourists in Jamaica at the time: ~25,000
- UN-organized airlift planned: 2,000 relief kits from Barbados
- Initial storm-related deaths reported across the region before Jamaica hit: 7 (3 in Jamaica, 3 in Haiti, 1 in the Dominican Republic)
On the Ground: Stories from Streets and Shelters
“Parts of our roof were blown off and other parts caved in and the entire house was flooded,” said Lisa Sangster, a Kingston resident whose courtyard now served as a sort of informal receiving station for neighbors. “Outside structures like our outdoor kitchen, dog kennel and farm animal pens were also gone, destroyed.”
In St Elizabeth, often called Jamaica’s breadbasket, farms lay submerged, sugarcane bent like reeds. “We plant to feed the island,” said Desmond McKenzie, a local MP who described the parish as “underwater.” “The damage to Saint Elizabeth is extensive. It’s going to affect food supply and livelihoods for months if not years.”
At an emergency shelter in Santiago de Cuba, volunteers handed out roasted breadfruit, bottles of water and makeshift blankets. There, an elderly woman named Ana clutched a photograph of her grandchildren and said, “We have faced storms before, but the noise of this one felt like the sea wanted to come in and take us.” These are the small human details that don’t make the early, stark headlines: the way neighbors pull tarpaulins over a ruined roof, the hush at once-boisterous rum shops, the decision to leave a family cat behind because there wasn’t room in the evacuation truck.
Why This Storm Feels Different
Climate scientists are blunt: storms like Melissa are becoming more frequent, more intense and—crucially—slower moving. A hurricane that creeps, dumps more rain and prolongs battering winds over the same piece of land. The result is catastrophic flooding, landslides in the highlands and the collapse of fragile infrastructure.
“Human-caused climate change is making all the worst aspects of Hurricane Melissa even worse,” said climate scientist Daniel Gilford. “Warmer seas feed greater energy into these storms. They hold more moisture, travel slower, and strike with a violence our communities are increasingly ill-equipped to absorb.”
Caribbean leaders have, for years, implored wealthy, high-emitting nations for more than momentary aid: for climate finance, for debt relief, for the kind of long-term investment that helps islands rebuild stronger and adapt for the future. After Melissa, those calls will only grow louder.
Questions We Should Be Asking
- How can small island states build resilient infrastructure when budgets are squeezed and storms become costlier?
- Are tourism-dependent economies sufficiently protected when the very weather that brings visitors can also dismantle livelihoods overnight?
- What does “reparations” look like in practical terms—grants, technology transfer, debt swaps for resilience projects?
Immediate Response and the Long Road Ahead
Relief efforts are mobilizing. The Jamaican Red Cross was distributing water and hygiene kits even as roads remained impassable in many places. The United Nations announced plans for an airlift of relief kits once flights could resume, and other international partners have promised aid to Cuba, Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
But aid is only the first step. Rebuilding will require coordinated planning, heavy investment in resilient housing, restoration of power grids and a transformation in how these nations manage land and coastal development. “We need resources not just to patch roofs, but to fundamentally rethink our infrastructure,” said Dr. Marisol Reyes, a Caribbean disaster risk expert. “Otherwise, storm after storm will simply wash away whatever we reconstruct.”
What You Can Do—And What This Means for the Planet
Watching images of Melissa’s aftermath, it’s natural to feel helpless. Yet there are concrete ways to respond. Donate to credible relief organizations operating locally. Support policy efforts aimed at climate justice. Remember that climate events in distant places are not isolated tragedies; they are signals of a warming planet that touches agriculture, migration and global supply chains everywhere.
How do you imagine your community holding up if a similar storm came? What would you prioritize—shelter, power, food security? The answers matter, because resilience isn’t just built by governments; it’s built by neighborhoods, families and the everyday decisions we make about preparedness and solidarity.
In the weeks to come, the true toll of Melissa will become clearer—how many roofs were lost, how many small businesses will never reopen, how many school terms will be disrupted. For now, the Caribbean mourns and starts the work of holding itself together: neighbors handing out hot food, volunteers clearing debris, governments tallying damage and the world watching—and, one hopes, learning.
