Overview
- Melissa traversed eastern Cuba after striking Jamaica as a Category 5, weakening to Category 1–2 strength by Wednesday night as it moved northeast.
- Cuba reported extensive flooding, infrastructure damage and widespread outages in Santiago de Cuba and Holguín, with about 735,000 people evacuated and no official fatalities reported there so far.
- Preliminary regional deaths climbed to roughly 30, with authorities citing about 25 in Haiti, several in Jamaica and one in the Dominican Republic, and officials warning the figures could change as access improves.
- Jamaica was declared a disaster zone after catastrophic winds and flooding severed communications, left roughly three-quarters of the island without power and sent more than 25,000 people to shelters.
- The UN prepared about 2,000 emergency kits for airlift to affected countries as the NHC warned of dangerous surge, wind and rain for the southeast and central Bahamas and a near approach to Bermuda.