Hurricane Melissa intensified to Category 5 strength on Monday as it neared Jamaica, with up to 76 centimetres (30 in) of rain and a life-threatening storm surge.
Melissa is forecast to make landfall on the island on Tuesday, and cross Cuba and the Bahamas through Wednesday.
Melissa was centred about 230 kilometres southwest of Kingston, the capital, and about 530 km southwest of Guantánamo, Cuba, the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said in its 11 a.m. ET update.
The hurricane had maximum sustained winds of 275 km/h and was moving west at 6 km/h, the centre said.
Fyi – 275 km/h = 171 mph and 6 kmh = 5.5 feet per second.
Jamaica is facing monumental devastation.
It’s very likely this will be the strongest recorded storm to ever make landfall in Jamaica.
1.6666 m/s
Uh oh… Good luck Jamaica.
And good luck Cuba.
And while we’re at it, Haiti and the DR too. :(
I’ll share my two favorite sources for hurricane info.
Tropical Tidbits for excellent parsing of meteorological data and models without much editorializing and essentially no fear mongering. Excellent videos and website tools for nerding out about the weather side of things.
https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/
And NOAA’s National Hurricane Center for up to date guidance on rain, flooding, and wind probabilities and warnings. This coupled with a local emergency services communications is what most people should be using to track what impacts they should expect for upcoming storms.
https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/ click on the storm in the map graphic to view detailed warnings and info.