Tag: hurricane

Dis­aster relief

Aid en route as island nations take stock of storm dam­age

People gather their belongings in the aftermath of Hurricane Melissa in Black River, Jamaica, Thursday. The storm killed 19 on the island.

This article was written by Ariel Fernandez, Andrea Rodriguez, and John Myers Jr., and was published in the Toronto Star on October 31, 2025.

The rumble of large machinery, whine of chain saws and chop­ping of machetes echoed through com­munit­ies across the north­ern Carib­bean on Thursday as they dug out from the destruc­tion of Hur­ricane Melissa and sur­veyed the dam­age left behind.

In Jamaica, gov­ern­ment work­ers and res­id­ents began clear­ing roads in a push to reach dozens of isol­ated com­munit­ies in the island’s south­east that sus­tained a dir­ect hit from one of the most power­ful Atlantic hur­ricanes on record.

Stunned res­id­ents wandered about, some star­ing at their roof­less homes and water­logged belong­ings strewn around them. “I don’t have a house now,” said Sylvester Guthrie, a res­id­ent of Lacovia in the south­ern par­ish of St. Eliza­beth.

Emer­gency relief flights were land­ing at Jamaica’s main inter­na­tional air­port as crews dis­trib­uted water, medi­cine and other basic sup­plies. Heli­copters dropped food as they thrummed above com­munit­ies where the storm flattened homes, wiped out roads and des­troyed bridges, cut­ting them off from assist­ance.

“The entire Jamaica is really broken because of what has happened,” Edu­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dana Mor­ris Dixon said.

Offi­cials said at least 19 people have died in Jamaica, includ­ing a child, and they expec­ted the death toll to keep rising. In one isol­ated com­munity, res­id­ents pleaded with offi­cials to remove the body of one vic­tim tangled in a tree. On Thursday, dozens of U.S. search­and­res­cue experts landed in Jamaica along with their dogs.

More than 13,000 people remained crowded into shel­ters, with 72 per cent of the island without power and only 35 per cent of mobile phone sites in oper­a­tion, offi­cials said.

In Cuba, heavy equip­ment began to clear blocked roads and high­ways and the mil­it­ary helped res­cue people trapped in isol­ated com­munit­ies and at risk from land­slides. No deaths were repor­ted after the Civil Defence evac­u­ated more than 735,000 people across east­ern Cuba ahead of the storm. Res­id­ents were slowly start­ing to return home Thursday.

Offi­cials from the affected provinces — San­ti­ago, Granma, Holguín, Guantánamo, and Las Tunas — repor­ted losses of roofs, power lines and fibre optic tele­com­mu­nic­a­tions cables, as well as roads cut off, isol­at­ing com­munit­ies, and heavy losses in banana, cas­sava and cof­fee plant­a­tions.

Melissa also unleashed cata­strophic flood­ing in Haiti, where at least 30 people were repor­ted killed and 20 oth­ers were miss­ing. Some 15,000 people also remained in shel­ters.

“It is a sad moment for the coun­try,” said Laurent Saint­Cyr, pres­id­ent of Haiti’s trans­itional pres­id­en­tial coun­cil. He said offi­cials expect the death toll to rise and noted that the gov­ern­ment was mobil­iz­ing resources to search for people and provide emer­gency relief.

Ott­awa announces $7 mil­lion for relief

Ott­awa has announced $7 mil­lion in human­it­arian relief for Carib­bean states hit by Hur­ricane Melissa — and the gov­ern­ment says it might deploy sol­diers if asked. “Canada stands with the people of the Carib­bean in its efforts at this moment, not with words but with action,” Randeep Sarai, sec­ret­ary of state for inter­na­tional devel­op­ment, said Thursday. “And we’ll be here tomor­row to help rebuild stronger, safer and more resi­li­ent com­munit­ies.”

No Cana­dians had been repor­ted miss­ing or dead as of Thursday morn­ing, Sarai said.

Caribbean countries pick up pieces after Hurricane Melissa

This article was written by Ariel Fernandez, Andrea Rodriguez, and John Myers Jr., and was published in the Globe & Mail on October 31, 2025.

Nicola Gowdie stands where only the foundation of her home remains after being hit by Hurricane Melissa, in St. Elizabeth, Jamaica, on Wednesday.

The rumble of large machinery, whine of chainsaws and chopping of machetes echoed through communities across the northern Caribbean on Thursday as they dug out from the destruction of Hurricane Melissa and surveyed the damage left behind.

In Jamaica, government workers and residents began clearing roads in a push to reach dozens of isolated communities in the island’s southeast that sustained a direct hit from one of the most powerful Atlantic hurricanes on record.

Stunned residents wandered about, some staring at their roofless homes and waterlogged belongings strewn around them.

“I don’t have a house now,” Sylvester Guthrie, a resident of Lacovia in the southern parish of St. Elizabeth, said as he held onto his bicycle, the only possession of value left after the storm.

Emergency relief flights began landing at Jamaica’s main international airport, which reopened late Wednesday, as crews distributed water, medicine and other basic supplies. Helicopters dropped food as they thrummed above communities where the storm flattened homes, wiped out roads and destroyed bridges, cutting them off from assistance.

“The entire Jamaica is really broken because of what has happened,” Education Minister Dana Morris Dixon said.

Police said at least 14 people have died in Jamaica, and they expected the death toll to keep rising. In one isolated community, residents pleaded with officials to remove the body of one victim tangled in a tree.

More than 13,000 people remained crowded into shelters, with 72 per cent of the island without power and only 35 per cent of mobile phone sites in operation, officials said. People clutched cash as they formed long lines at the few gas stations and supermarkets open in affected areas.

Water trucks have been mobilized to serve many of Jamaica’s rural communities that are not connected to the government’s utility system, Water Minister Matthew Samuda said.

In Cuba, heavy equipment began to clear blocked roads and highways and the military helped rescue people trapped in isolated communities and at risk from landslides.

No deaths were reported after the Civil Defence evacuated more than 735,000 people across eastern Cuba ahead of the storm. Residents were slowly starting to return home Thursday.

The town of El Cobre in the eastern province of Santiago de Cuba was one of the hardest hit. Home to some 7,000 people, it is also the site of the Basilica of Our Lady of Charity, the patron saint of Cuba who is deeply venerated by Catholics and practitioners of Santería, an AfroCuban religion.

“We went through this very badly. So much wind, so much wind. Zinc roofs were torn off. Some houses completely collapsed. It was a disaster,” Odalys Ojeda, a 61-year-old retiree, said as she looked up at the sky from her living room where the roof and other parts of the house were torn away.

Melissa also unleashed catastrophic flooding in Haiti, where at least 30 people were reported killed and 20 others were missing, mostly in the country’s southern region. Some 15,000 people also remained in shelters.

“It is a sad moment for the country,” said Laurent Saint-Cyr, president of Haiti’s transitional presidential council.

He said officials expect the death toll to rise and noted that the government was mobilizing resources to search for people and provide emergency relief.

Storm’s toll

Hur­ricane Melissa leaves dozens dead, miss­ing in Carib­bean

Residents walk through Lacovia Tombstone, Jamaica, in the aftermath of Hurricane Melissa on Wednesday. More than 77 per cent of the country is now without electricity and more than 25,000 people are in shelters across the island, authorities said.

This article was written by Jason Miller and Abby O’Brien, and was published in the Toronto Star on October 30, 2025.

At least 25 people are dead in Haiti and more than a dozen are miss­ing after a river in the town of PetitGoâve, south­w­est of Port­auPrince, flooded while Jamaica picked up the pieces, with local author­it­ies call­ing early images of the power­ful Cat­egory 5 storm after­math dev­ast­at­ing.

Emmanuel Pierre, the head of the Haitian Office of Civil Pro­tec­tion, told the Miami Her­ald that the deaths occurred after the Digue River flooded the town, wash­ing away homes and bury­ing them under mud. “It’s an area where we had vis­ited try­ing to get people to evac­u­ate, but they did not want to leave,” Pierre said.

Three storm­related deaths were con­firmed while Melissa was still a trop­ical storm as it approached the coun­try’s south­ern pen­in­sula.

Of those who washed away in the flooded river, 10 were chil­dren. Sev­en­teen people were injured.

Hur­ricane Melissa has left at least 34 dead in the Carib­bean.

There have been no repor­ted deaths or life­threat­en­ing injur­ies among the roughly 25,000 vis­it­ors, includ­ing the estim­ated 2,024 Cana­dians’ known to be in Jamaica, said Tour­ism Min­is­ter Edmund Bart­lett, adding that one tour­ist was treated in hos­pital for a stroke and there were a few who sus­tained lacer­a­tions as the trop­ical storm poun­ded Jamaica Tues­day after­noon.

“They’re all safe,” Bart­lett told the Star Wed­nes­day morn­ing about the con­di­tion of for­eign­ers who were hunkered down in hotels and other types of accom­mod­a­tions, in sev­eral key tour­ist zones such as Mon­t­ego Bay, Negril and Fal­mouth, when the storm hit the island nation at Cat­egory 5 force, never before seen in Jamaica’s recor­ded his­tory. “We’ve not had any (tour­ist) cas­u­al­ties.”

More than 77 per cent of the coun­try is now without elec­tri­city and in excess of 25,000 people are in shel­ters across the island, said Jamaican author­it­ies Wed­nes­day, as gov­ern­ment lead­ers star­ted ini­tial assess­ments to get a clearer pic­ture of the full extent of the dam­age. Pub­lic works teams are already out clear­ing blocked road­ways.

“Our hous­ing stock has taken a ser­i­ous bat­ter­ing,” Bart­lett said of dam­age to local com­munit­ies. “There was quite a bit of dev­ast­a­tion in terms of util­it­ies.”

Scar­bor­ough res­id­ent Rhondanee Thel­well said she made phone con­tact, Wed­nes­day morn­ing, with rel­at­ives in the coastal com­munity of Bel­mont, West­mo­re­land, where the eye of the hur­ricane made land­fall Tues­day. “Bel­mont is flattened. Roofs have been torn off the homes, and many homes have been des­troyed. It’s all gone.”

Thel­well, 42, who grew up in West­mo­re­land before immig­rat­ing to Canada, said “there has been total dev­ast­a­tion,” in Bel­mont and “hun­dreds of fam­il­ies are affected.”

Thel­well was only able to get bits of detail before los­ing phone con­tact with her fam­ily Wed­nes­day.

She said many of her fam­ily mem­bers will now have to find altern­at­ive accom­mod­a­tions.

“It’s going to be over­whelm­ing,” she said of the recov­ery, adding that she’s plan­ning to visit Jamaica to assist with the rebuild.

Chey­anne Robertson was in Mon­t­ego Bay, cel­eb­rat­ing her hon­ey­moon with her hus­band, Ash­ley, when Melissa hit.

Around 6 a.m. on Tues­day, the couple was ushered into an amphi­theatre inside the resort with at least 100 other guests to weather the storm. They weren’t able to see the dev­ast­a­tion, but could hear the down­pour and howl­ing wind, Robertson said on Wed­nes­day.

When they came out more than 12 hours later, the dam­age was clear. The winds had stripped roofs off nearby build­ings. Cabanas, once cemen­ted to the ground, were strewn across the prop­erty. Dozens of palm trees that dec­or­ated the resort’s beaches were stripped bare.

“I can’t ima­gine what it’s like throughout the whole coun­try,” Robertson said.

Lisa and Evan Winslow, both 37, are vis­it­ing Jamaica for the first time, and the couple from just out­side of Thun­der Bay, are tak­ing everything in stride.

“We’re in good spir­its,” said Evan. The couple is stay­ing at the Prin­cess Senses The Man­grove, which is not far from Negril. They saw 150 km/h winds com­ing in last night and huge rolling waves, but since the resort is a newer build, dam­age has been lim­ited to glass on walk­ways and trees that have been uprooted. It was the first trip for the couple in 13 years, and the first away from their two chil­dren. They have kept in touch every­day so that every­one at home knows they are OK.

Author­it­ies had pre­vi­ously repor­ted that three Jamaican cit­izens were killed, includ­ing one per­son killed by elec­tro­cu­tion, while they were pre­par­ing for the storm to make land­fall.

Bart­lett said work is already under­way to get both inter­na­tional air­ports oper­a­tional, with the expect­a­tion that King­ston’s Nor­man Man­ley Inter­na­tional Air­port would resume flights as early as Thursday.

Hurricane Melissa leaves trail of destruction in Jamaica, Haiti and Cuba

This article was written by Ariel Fernandez, Andrea Rodriguez, John Myers Jr. and Evens Sanon, and was published in the Globe & Mail on October 30, 2025.

Residents walk through Lacovia Tombstone, Jamaica, in the aftermath of Hurricane Melissa, on Wednesday. Jamaica’s Education Minister said 77 per cent of the island was without power.

At least 23 people dead, 13 missing across Haiti; eight people reported dead in Jamaica

Hurricane Melissa left at least dozens dead amid widespread destruction across Cuba, Haiti and Jamaica, where roofless homes, toppled utility poles and waterlogged furniture dominated the landscape Wednesday.

A landslide blocked the main roads of Santa Cruz in Jamaica’s St. Elizabeth parish, where the streets were reduced to mud pits. Residents swept water from homes as they tried to salvage belongings. Wind ripped off part of the roof at a high school that serves as a public shelter.

“I never see anything like this before in all my years living here,” resident Jennifer Small said.

The extent of the damage from the deadly Category 5 hurricane was unclear Wednesday as widespread power outages and dangerous conditions persisted.

“It is too early for us to say definitively,” said Dana Morris Dixon, Jamaica’s Education Minister.

Melissa made landfall Tuesday in Jamaica with top winds of 295 kilometres an hour, one of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes on record, before weakening and moving on to Cuba, but even countries outside the direct path of the massive storm felt its devastating effects.

At least 23 people have died across Haiti and 13 are missing, Haiti’s Civil Protection Agency said in a statement, revising the death toll downward Wednesday. Twenty of those reported dead and 10 of the missing are from a southern coastal town where flooding collapsed dozens of homes. At least eight are dead in Jamaica.

In Cuba, officials reported collapsed houses, blocked mountain roads and roofs blown off buildings Wednesday, with the heaviest destruction concentrated in the southwest and northwest. Authorities said about 735,000 people remained in shelters.

“That was hell. All night long, it was terrible,” said Reinaldo Charon in Santiago de Cuba. The 52year-old was one of the few people venturing out Wednesday, covered by a plastic sheet in the intermittent rain.

In Jamaica, more than 25,000 people were packed into shelters Wednesday and more streamed in throughout the day after the storm ripped roofs off their homes and left them temporarily homeless. Ms. Dixon said 77 per cent of the island was without power.

The outages complicated assessing the damage because of “a total communication blackout” in areas, Richard Thompson, acting director-general of Jamaica’s Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management, told the Nationwide News Network radio station.

“Recovery will take time, but the government is fully mobilized,” Prime Minister Andrew Holness said in a statement. “Relief supplies are being prepared, and we are doing everything possible to restore normalcy quickly.”

Officials in Black River, Jamaica, a coastal town of approximately 5,000 people in the southwestern part of the island, pleaded for aid at a news conference Wednesday.

“Catastrophic is a mild term based on what we are observing,” Mayor Richard Solomon said.

Mr. Solomon said the local rescue infrastructure had been demolished by the storm. The hospital, police units and emergency services were inundated by floods and unable to conduct emergency operations.

Jamaican Transportation Minister Daryl Vaz said two of the island’s airports reopened Wednesday to relief flights only, with UN agencies and dozens of nonprofits on standby to distribute basic goods. “The devastation is enormous,” he said. “We need all hands on deck to recover stronger and to help those in need at this time.”

The United States is sending rescue and response teams to assist in recovery efforts in the Caribbean, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced on X.

St. Elizabeth Police Superintendent Coleridge Minto told Nationwide News Network on Wednesday that authorities have found at least four bodies in southwest Jamaica. One death was reported in the west when a tree fell on a baby, state minister Abka Fitz-Henley told Nationwide News Network.

Before landfall, Melissa had already been blamed for three deaths in Jamaica, three in Haiti and one in the Dominican Republic.

Cana­dians con­cerned for rel­at­ives on island

Some exper­i­en­cing dif­fi­culty con­tact­ing their loved ones

This article was written by Jason Miller and Abby O’Brien and was published in the Toronto Star on October 29, 2025.

Scar­bor­ough res­id­ent Rhondanee Thel­well was anxious as Hur­ricane Melissa made land­fall Tues­day, wor­ried about rel­at­ives in West­mo­re­land, Jamaica as the storm brought a tor­ren­tial down­pour, gale­force winds and flood­ing in low lying areas.

Thel­well, 42, said her rel­at­ives are hunkered down at home deal­ing with the sus­tained rain­fall, surge in sea levels and flood­ing as it reached the south­w­est coast of the island nation Tues­day — slam­ming into the par­ishes of West­mo­re­land and St. Eliza­beth.

“The south­ern coast of West­mo­re­land is exper­i­en­cing the full force of Melissa, with roofs being ripped from homes and swept over the shores,” she said of reports from fam­ily in the area.

Tues­day even­ing, Rohan Brown, man­ager with the Met­eor­o­lo­gical Ser­vice of Jamaica said that by late Tues­day after­noon, the centre (eye) of the storm had reached just east of Mon­t­ego Bay and has been down­graded to a Cat­egory 4 hur­ricane. Brown warned that the sys­tem covered a sig­ni­fic­ant area of the island with “dam­aging hur­ricane force winds to con­tinue across,” west­ern sec­tions of the island.

“It is a large hur­ricane and even as it moves off, the eye­wall will fol­low behind it and then the spiral bands will also fol­low behind it,” Brown said. “Tonight, into tomor­row, we still will be get­ting heavy rain­fall, and we’ll still get strong gusty winds.”

Thel­well said in some parts of the par­ish “a trail of destruc­tion is evid­ent, with sev­eral homes los­ing their roofs and trees crash­ing onto houses, shat­ter­ing win­dows and allow­ing rain to flood in.”

The National Hur­ricane Cen­ter has warned that people should stay inside as the eye of the storm passes because winds will rap­idly increase on the other side of the eye.

Thel­well said that flood­ing in the area has forced the care­taker at a hobby farm she owns in Petersfield, West­mo­re­land, about a 20­minute drive from the south coast of the par­ish, to relo­cate the cattle and goats to higher ground.

“I encour­aged them not to go out­side,” she said of her fam­ily in West­mo­re­land.

Though she was able to speak to her imme­di­ate fam­ily — includ­ing her brother, who is in neigh­bour­ing St. James par­ish and sev­eral of her cous­ins based in West­mo­re­land — by phone Tues­day morn­ing, she has since been hav­ing dif­fi­culty con­tact­ing them.

The loss of power is impact­ing tele­com­mu­nic­a­tion ser­vices, with some mobile phone cus­tom­ers deal­ing with blotchy or no ser­vice at all, he said.

Daryl Vaz, the min­is­ter of trans­port, tele­com­mu­nic­a­tions and energy, said dur­ing a press con­fer­ence Tues­day while there will be “poten­tially dis­abling impacts” at the Don­ald Sang­ster Inter­na­tional Air­port in Mon­t­ego Bay, there will be less dis­rup­tion at the King­ston­based Nor­man Man­ley Inter­na­tional Air­port, and crews will be out as early as Wed­nes­day “to inspect and clean up the (King­ston) facil­ity and restore the equip­ment.” He said King­ston should be able to accom­mod­ate emer­gency relief flights as early as Thursday. Plans are also in place to accom­mod­ate cer­tain types of air­craft at Ian Flem­ing Inter­na­tional Air­port loc­ated in Boscobel, St. Mary Par­ish, but he didn’t say when pas­sen­gers, includ­ing Cana­dians stuck on the island, would be able to leave the island.

Jamaican author­it­ies said that more than 6,000 people are cur­rently being housed at 382 shel­ters across the island. Evan Thompson, the prin­cipal dir­ector of the Met­eor­o­lo­gical Ser­vice of Jamaica (Met Ser­vice) warned, dur­ing a press con­fer­ence Tues­day, that res­id­ents should stay inside at all costs.

“It will cause cata­strophic dam­age, life­threat­en­ing dam­age,” Thompson said. “Regard­less of where you are in the par­ish of West­mo­re­land or St. Eliza­beth, if you are under the impact of those cat­egory five hur­ricane force winds, you will be hav­ing sig­ni­fic­ant dif­fi­culty.”

Retired Toronto Star journ­al­ist Royson James said he was unable to reach his 94­year­old mother at her home, just out­side Mon­t­ego Bay, due to the blotchy mobile phone ser­vice. While he was able to reach her via phone up until Monday night, all attempts to text or call her was unsuc­cess­ful Tues­day after­noon.

It is really, really stress­ful. Being par­ents, we’re a mess … It’ll be hell just sit­ting and wait­ing to know if your child is going to make it out.

BLANE LAPACHUK, WHOSE DAUGHTER IS ON HER HONEYMOON IN JAMAICA

“The storm is going on land now, so I wanted to see how it was, but I’m not get­ting through,” he said. “It could be that the lines are jammed.”

He said his mother, who is with a care­giver, had done everything pos­sible to pre­pare for the storm.

“They have been wait­ing and watch­ing this for days,” he said. “The pro­jec­tions don’t bode well. The shift has moved it from the cor­por­ate area in King­ston to the tour­ist areas, and that’s where we live, so we’re in a lot more danger.”

Blane Lapachuk is doing his best to man­age his fears between updates from his daugh­ter, Chey­anne, cur­rently on her hon­ey­moon in Mon­t­ego Bay. “It is really, really stress­ful,” Lapachuk, from Stony Plain, Alberta, told the Star. “Being par­ents, we’re a mess.”

Chey­anne and her hus­band, Ash­ley, arrived at the Ibero­star Waves Rose Hall Beach resort on Oct. 20. They only learned of the fore­cas­ted storm after their arrival, he said.

As of Tues­day, Chey­anne and Ash­ley were shel­ter­ing inside the hotel with at least 100 other guests. Win­dows and doors at the resort were boarded up so they aren’t able to see the con­di­tions out­side.

So far, the couple has been able to charge their phones and remain in con­tact with their loved ones, though Lapachuk expects those updates will come to an end when the power goes out. He’s not sure what will hap­pen after that, he said.

“It’ll be hell just sit­ting and wait­ing to know if your child is going to make it out,” he said.

Category 5 storm barrels toward Cuba as Jamaica begins to assess the damage

This article was written by John Myers Jr. and Danica Coto, and was published in the Globe & Mail on October 29, 2025.

Storm leaves nearly 15,000 people in shelters and some 540,000 without power, officials say

Heavy floodwaters swept across southwestern Jamaica, winds tore roofs off buildings and boulders tumbled onto roads Tuesday as Hurricane Melissa came ashore as a catastrophic Category 5 storm, one of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes on record.

Landslides, fallen trees and numerous power outages were reported as Melissa hit with 295 km/h winds near New Hope, with officials cautioning that the cleanup and damage assessment could be slow.

“There is no infrastructure in the region that can withstand a Category 5,” Prime Minister Andrew Holness said. “The question now is the speed of recovery. That’s the challenge.”

Floodwaters trapped at least three families in their homes in the community of Black River in western Jamaica, and crews were unable to help them because of dangerous conditions, said Desmond McKenzie, deputy chairman of Jamaica’s Disaster Risk Management Council.

“Roofs were flying off,” he said. “We are hoping and praying that the situation will ease so that some attempt can be made to get to those persons.”

He noted that extensive damage was reported in the southwestern parish of St. Elizabeth, which he said “is underwater.”

Mr. McKenzie said there are no confirmed reports of deaths and stressed that it was too early to talk about the extent of the damage because the hurricane – the strongest to hit the island since recordkeeping began 174 years ago – was still pummelling the country.

Rohan Brown, with Jamaica’s Meteorological Service, warned that as Melissa moves off the coast, its counterclockwise rotation will bring a heavy storm surge to northern Jamaica through the night. The storm is headed toward Cuba, where it was expected to make landfall as a major hurricane early Wednesday.

Nearly 15,000 people were in shelters in Jamaica and some 540,000 customers, or 77 per cent, were without power, officials said.

Colin Bogle, a Mercy Corps adviser, said most families were sheltering in place despite the government ordering evacuations in flood-prone communities. He was sheltering with his grandmother in Portmore, where everything went dark after a loud explosion.

“The noise is relentless,” he said. “People are anxious and just trying to hold on until the storm passes.”

On Tuesday night, Melissa had top sustained winds of 205 km/h and was moving north-northeast at 13 km/h as its centre moved into the Caribbean Sea, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami. The hurricane was centred about 80 kilometres east-northeast of Montego Bay, Jamaica, and about 260 kilometres southwest of Guantánamo, Cuba.

Its 295 km/h winds and 892 millibars of central pressure tied two records for the strongest Atlantic storm at landfall. The pressure – the key measurement meteorologists use – tied 1935’s Labour Day hurricane in Florida. The wind speed tied the 1935 hurricane and 2019’s Hurricane Dorian, said hurricane scientists Phil Klotzbach of Colorado State University and Brian McNoldy of the University of Miami.

“It’s been a remarkable, just a beast of a storm,” Mr. Klotzbach told the Associated Press.

With a life-threatening storm surge of up to four metres expected, officials were concerned about hospitals along the coast. Mr. McKenzie said four main hospitals were damaged, with the storm knocking out power to one of them, forcing officials to evacuate 75 patients.

One man called a radio station saying he urgently needed to help a woman in western Jamaica who had gone into labour as the storm neared landfall. The show’s host pleaded with listeners to let him know the safest hospital before an obstetrician called in to provide detailed directions on how to deliver a baby, if necessary.

In Kingston, officials warned residents of the surrounding area to watch out for crocodiles that might be displaced from their habitats by flooding.

Mr. McKenzie said the government was prepared for rescues immediately after the storm passes through: “We have boats, helicopters, you name it.”

The storm already was blamed for seven deaths in the Caribbean, including three in Jamaica, three in Haiti and one in the Dominican Republic, where another person remains missing.

Tuesday evening, officials huddled in meetings to determine how best to clear the debris after the storm and launch the distribution of emergency relief supplies to avoid bottlenecks at Jamaica’s ports, said Richard Thompson, acting general director for Jamaica’s emergency management office.

Officials have said they hope to reopen the island’s airports by Thursday.

UN agencies and dozens of non-profits had food, medicine and other essential supplies positioned as they awaited a distribution rush after the storm.

Melissa was expected to make landfall in eastern Cuba late Tuesday or early Wednesday. Up to 51 centimetres of rain was forecast in areas, along with a significant storm surge along the coast.

In a televised address to the nation Tuesday, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel urged the population not to underestimate the power of the storm, “the strongest ever to hit national territory.”

In the eastern province of Santiago de Cuba, people streamed into the home of 83-year-old Eduviges Figueroa at the foot of the Sierra Maestra mountains to seek shelter after fleeing their homes in remote areas by bus, truck and even horse-drawn carts.

“We’re helping as best we can,” she said. “Now I’m cooking for everyone.”

People in Santiago de Cuba, the island’s second-largest city with more than one million inhabitants, spent Tuesday frantically preparing. Few people were on the streets, while state television showed Cubans in rural areas rounding up animals and protecting crops.

Diamon Mendoza, 36, did not hide her concern about the unavoidable storm.

“May God have mercy on us, because it’s coming with a lot of strength,” Ms. Mendoza said. “Anything can happen.”

Authorities in eastern Holguín province prepared to evacuate more than 200,000 people Tuesday and evacuated a similar number of people earlier from the town of Banes.

Reports on social media and state television showed blue and white buses ferrying evacuees to shelter early Tuesday. Families clutched babies and belongings and elderly people steadied themselves with canes as they disembarked.

Landslides, fallen trees and numerous power outages were reported as Melissa hit with 295 km/h winds near New Hope.

Bra­cing for impact

Cata­strophic flood­ing feared as Cat­egory 5 hur­ricane bar­rels toward Jamaica

Workers board up shop windows on Sunday ahead of Hurricane Melissa's arrival in Kingston, Jamaica. The Category 5 storm was expected to make landfall on Tuesday and officials warn it could be one of the worst in Jamaica's history.

This article was written by Abby O’Brien and Jason Miller, and was published in the Toronto Star on October 28, 2025.

Jamaic­ans and tour­ists, includ­ing many vaca­tion­ing Cana­dians, are bra­cing for gale­force winds, cata­strophic flood­ing and a surge in sea levels ahead of Hur­ricane Melissa, expec­ted to make land­fall Tues­day as one of the worst storms in the coun­try’s his­tory.

But the con­cerns about the destruct­ive poten­tial of the Cat­egory 5 storm stretch bey­ond the bor­ders of the small Carib­bean coun­try, which holds a strong dia­spora of nearly 150,000 in Toronto.

“We have no idea what Jamaica will look like after,” David Betty, the pres­id­ent of the Jamaican Cana­dian Asso­ci­ation, told the Star. “We’re bey­ond believ­ing that we’re going to escape this. We’re almost cer­tain that it’s going to make land­fall and that it’s going to be dev­ast­at­ing.”

At least seven areas on the island nation were issued evac­u­ation orders on Monday ahead of Hur­ricane Melissa’s arrival. The storm threatens “cata­strophic” dam­age when it makes its arrival Tues­day morn­ing.

A hand­ful of deaths in the Carib­bean have already been attrib­uted to the storm, includ­ing in Jamaica. The death toll is expec­ted to rise.

Early reports indic­ated that more than 50,000 of the islands’ nearly 2.9 mil­lion people are already without elec­tri­city. Offi­cials say addi­tional wide­spread power out­ages and dis­rup­tion to util­it­ies are pos­sible once the storm lands.

Markham res­id­ent Ham­let Nation said the well­being of his par­ents, who live in Clar­en­don, one of the par­ishes where the hur­ricane is pro­jec­ted to make land­fall, is top of mind.

His mother, 67, and father, 70, have stocked up on sup­plies such as food, drink­ing water and neces­sary med­ic­a­tion.

“When I spoke to my mom this morn­ing, they were char­ging their devices because they are anti­cip­at­ing that the elec­tri­city will go out,” said Nation, who served as a prac­tising phys­i­cian in Jamaica up until he migrated to Canada in 2020. “I’m con­cerned about how they’re going to fair.”

Nation’s greatest fear is that the hur­ricane will remain a Cat­egory 5 storm when it lands on the island.

As of Monday, both of the island’s inter­na­tional air­ports were closed and man­dat­ory evac­u­ations are in place in seven com­munit­ies in the south­ern part of the island — near the coastal areas of the par­ishes of King­ston, St. Andrew and Cath­er­ine. Author­it­ies tell the Star that list is expec­ted to grow as the storm closes in.

Those who intend to remain on the island when Melissa hits have been told not to ven­ture from their shel­ter and to pre­pare for the pos­sib­il­ity of flash flood­ing and land­slides.

Anxi­et­ies are high amongst Cana­dian tour­ists stran­ded on the island.

“My stom­ach is in knots,” Bur­l­ing­ton res­id­ent Pau­line Driscoll, who’s been at a San­dals Resort in Ocho Rios since Oct. 21, told the Star. “We can’t really ima­gine what we are in for.”

Driscoll, one of many vis­it­ing Cana­dians who will ride the storm out along­side loc­als, says con­di­tions at the resort were rel­at­ively calm on Monday.

Guests who are stay­ing at the resort have been ushered into a single build­ing and are being provided with daily updates, she said. If the prop­erty loses power, which Driscoll says she expects will be the case, there are gen­er­at­ors in place. Only one of the resort’s res­taur­ants is still serving food and alco­hol sales have been paused.

“They want every­one to be cap­able of fol­low­ing instruc­tions when needed,” Driscoll said.

About an hour west of San­dals, the Emms fam­ily, from Nova Sco­tia, has found them­selves in a sim­ilar situ­ation.

Allison Emms arrived at Ocean Coral Spring Resort in Fal­mouth with her hus­band, son and fam­ily friends last Wed­nes­day, only learn­ing of the impend­ing storm when she got to the island.

Emms told the Star she’s repeatedly tried to book an earlier flight home to no avail. “I ser­i­ously don’t under­stand,” she said. “(Air Canada) should have done emer­gency flights. I’m scared for me and my fam­ily’s lives.”

Both Air Canada and West­Jet told the Star that flights to and from the island des­tin­a­tion have been can­celled amid the severe weather, with oper­a­tions expec­ted to resume at some point on Wed­nes­day. Air Canada noted that it had provided an extra flight and sub­sti­tuted a lar­ger air­craft on Sat­urday with approx­im­ately 600 seats to bring people back to Canada ahead of the hur­ricane.

When reached for com­ment by the Star, Global Affairs Canada said it is closely track­ing Melissa’s pro­gress.

There are cur­rently 1,959 Cana­dians in Jamaica lis­ted with the Regis­tra­tion of Cana­dians Abroad ser­vice; however, this num­ber is only an estim­a­tion as regis­tra­tion is vol­un­tary, the agency said.

Canada has cur­rently advised all cit­izens against trav­el­ling to Jamaica. Those on the ground should check with their air­line dir­ectly regard­ing the status of their flights, the agency said.

In an address earlier on Monday, Jamaican Prime Min­is­ter Andrew Hol­ness encour­aged res­id­ents to look out for one another.

“Check on your neigh­bours, espe­cially the eld­erly and vul­ner­able, and con­tinue to pray for our nation’s safety,” he said.

In case of crip­pling dam­age to the ports and major man­u­fac­tur­ing facil­it­ies, Hol­ness estim­ates the nation has food and goods to last 12 weeks, along with enough refined pet­ro­leum products to serve for about 10 days after the hur­ricane hits. There are roughly 880 shel­ters avail­able across the island, but only 79 were opened to respond to the cur­rent need as of Monday even­ing.

Closer to home, Betty, the pres­id­ent of the Jamaican Cana­dian Asso­ci­ation, says plans are already in the works to fun­draise for island com­munit­ies, and he has been in talks with organ­iz­a­tions in the Jamaican dia­spora to see how they might pool their efforts.

“We have mobil­ized,” he said. “We’re def­in­itely going to be doing some sort of fun­drais­ing.”

Melissa marks the third Cat­egory 5 storm of the 2025 hur­ricane sea­son. It is expec­ted to make land­fall in east­ern Cuba Tues­day night, where some areas are expec­ted to get up to 51 cen­ti­metres of rain­fall, before mov­ing through por­tions of south­east­ern Bahamas on Wed­nes­day.

The dam­age from Melissa’s strong winds and deep pock­ets of flood­ing rain will be worsened by the storm’s incred­ibly slow speed. On Monday after­noon, the mon­ster storm was crawl­ing at about five kilo­metres per hour.

Fore­casters said that sets Jamaica up to be battered for days — far bey­ond the daylong impacts of the storm’s eye. It’s sim­ilar to what Cat­egory 5 Dorian did in 2019 to the Abaco Islands in the Bahamas, which it left bull­dozed after the hur­ricane parked over the islands.

The last time the Atlantic pro­duced three or more Cat­egory 5 storms was 2005.

TYPHOON KAJIKI HITS COAST OF VIETNAM, FELLING TREES AND FLOODING HOMES

This article was written by Reuters News and was published in the Globe & Mail on August 26, 2025.

Locals ride a motorbike through partially flooded streets in Vinh city, in Vietnam’s Nghe An province on Monday owing to Typhoon Kajiki.

Typhoon Kajiki brought torrential rains to Vietnam’s north central coast on Monday, felling trees and flooding homes, despite wind speeds tapering off from earlier in the day.

As of 5 a.m. ET, Kajiki was on the coast of Nghe An and Ha Tinh provinces, with wind speed easing to 118-133 kilometres an hour from as strong as 166 km/h, according to the country’s weather agency.

“It’s terrifying,” said Dang Xuan Phuong, a 48-year-old resident of Cua Lo, a tourism town in Nghe An province directly hit by the storm.

“When I look down from the higher floors I could see waves as tall as two metres, and the water has flooded the roads around us,” Mr. Phuong told Reuters.

State media reports said power in several areas in Ha Tinh province had been cut off, roofs were blown out and floating fishing farms were washed away.

Vietnam had earlier shut airports, closed schools and begun mass evacuations as it prepared for the most powerful storm so far this year.

The government warned earlier of “an extremely dangerous fast-moving storm,” adding that Kajiki would bring heavy rains, flooding and landslides.

With a long coastline facing the South China Sea, Vietnam is prone to storms that are often deadly and trigger dangerous flooding and mudslides.

The weather agency said rainfall could reach 500 millimetres from Monday afternoon until the end of Tuesday in several parts of northern Vietnam. The Vietnamese government said earlier on Monday about 30,000 people had been evacuated from coastal areas. More than 16,500 soldiers and 107,000 paramilitary personnel had been mobilized to help with the evacuation and stand by for search and rescue.

Two airports in Thanh Hoa and Quang Binh provinces were closed, according to the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam. Vietnam Airlines and Vietjet cancelled dozens of flights to and from the area on Sunday and Monday.

Kajiki skirted the southern coast of China’s Hainan Island on Sunday as it moved toward Vietnam

Hurricane Erin intensifies, creates menacing waves, as it moves toward the U.S. East Coast

This article was written by Allen G. Breed and John Seewer, and was published in the Globe & Mail on August 21, 2025.

Hurricane Erin began strengthening again Wednesday while creeping closer to the mid-Atlantic Coast and churning up menacing waves that have closed beaches from the Carolinas to New York.

Forecasters expect the storm to peak going into Thursday and say it could reintensify into a major hurricane.

While Erin is unlikely to make landfall along the East Coast before turning farther out to sea, its outer edge packing tropical force winds was approaching North Carolina’s Outer Banks.

Water began pouring onto the main route connecting the barrier islands and around a handful of stilted homes precariously perched above the beach. By Wednesday evening, officials had closed Highway 12 on Hatteras Island as surge increased and waves were growing higher, while Ocracoke Island’s connection to its ferry terminal was cut off.

Authorities expect the largest swells during high tide will cut off villages and vacation homes on the Outer Banks and whip up lifethreatening rip currents from Florida to New England.

New York closed its beaches to swimming on Wednesday and Thursday. Some beaches in New Jersey, Maryland and Delaware also will be temporarily off-limits. The storm is expected to bring widespread, moderate coastal flooding to low-lying areas of Long Island and parts of New York.

Off Massachusetts, Nantucket Island could see waves of more than three metres later this week. But the biggest threat remained along the Outer Banks, where long-time residents didn’t seem too concerned.

“I remember taking canoes out of my front yard to get to school, so I don’t think it’s gonna be that bad,” said Jacob Throne, who lives on Hatteras Island and works for surf shops.

Surfers flocked to the oceanfront in Virginia Beach, where Erin was supplying robust waves for the East Coast Surfing Championships and the kind of swells that many locals hadn’t seen in a while.

“We’re notorious for not having waves,” said Henry Thompson, who competed in the open long board event. “Usually we get a surf competition and it gets cancelled due to no waves or they just run it in really bad waves.”

The championships will pause Thursday when Erin blows directly off the Virginia coast. But Mr. Thompson said he’s expecting more hurricanes and good surfing in the coming months.

Despite beach closings elsewhere, some swimmers were continuing to ignore the warnings. Rescuers saved more than a dozen people caught in rip currents Tuesday at Wrightsville Beach in North Carolina – a day after more than 80 people were rescued.

Bob Oravec, a National Weather Service forecaster, said even if someone thinks they know how to handle a rip current, it’s still not safe.

“You can be aware all you want,” he said. “It can still be dangerous.”

A combination of fierce winds and huge waves – estimated to be about 6.1 metres – could cause coastal flooding in many beachfront communities, North Carolina officials warned on Wednesday.

“Dangerous conditions can be felt far from the eye, especially with a system as large as Erin,” said Will Ray, the state’s emergency management director.

Dozens of beach homes already worn down from chronic beach erosion and protective dunes could be at risk, said David Hallac, superintendent of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore.

The National Hurricane Center is also watching two tropical disturbances to the east of Erin that could develop into named cyclones. With thousands of miles of warm ocean water, hurricanes known as Cape Verde storms are some of the most dangerous that threaten North America.

Hurricane Erin threatens U.S. coastlines

This article was written by Allen G. Breed and John Seewer, and was published in the Globe & Mail on August 20, 2025.

Hurricane Erin churned slowly toward the eastern U.S. Tuesday, stirring up treacherous waves that already have led to dozens of water rescues and shut down beaches along the coast in the midst of summer’s last hurrah.

While forecasters remain confident the centre of the monster storm will remain far offshore, the outer edges are likely to bring damaging tropical-force winds, large swells and life-threatening rip currents into Friday.

Warnings about rip currents have been posted from Florida to the New England coast with New York City closing its beaches to swimming on Wednesday and Thursday. Several Long Island and New Jersey beaches also will be off-limits.

“Enjoy the shore, enjoy this beautiful weather but stay out of the water,” New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy said Tuesday.

Off Massachusetts, Nantucket Island could see waves of more than three metres later this week. But the biggest threat is along the barrier islands of North Carolina’s Outer Banks, where evacuations have been ordered. One town asked residents to secure their trash cans so they don’t float or blow away.

Erin has become an unusually large and deceptively worrisome storm while moving through the Caribbean, with its tropical storm winds stretching 370 kilometres from its core. Forecasters expect it will grow larger in size as it moves through the Atlantic and curls north. It continued to lash the Turks and Caicos Islands on Tuesday, where government services were suspended a day earlier and residents were ordered to stay home, along with parts of the Bahamas before its expected turn toward Bermuda and the U.S.

By Tuesday, Erin had lost some strength from previous days and dropped to a Category 2 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 170 km/h, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said. It was about 990 kilometres southsoutheast of North Carolina’s Cape Hatteras.

Tropical storm watches were issued for Virginia and North Carolina as well as Bermuda.

Rough ocean conditions already have been seen along the U.S. coast – at least 60 swimmers were rescued from rip currents Monday at Wrightsville Beach, near Wilmington, N.C.

The biggest swells along the East Coast are expected over the coming two days.

Climate scientists say Atlantic hurricanes are now much more likely to rapidly intensify into powerful and catastrophic storms fueled by warmer oceans.

On the Outer Banks, Erin’s storm surge could swamp roads with waves of 4.6 metres.