At least 31 people have died in relation to Hurricane Melissa as of Wednesday (October 29).
At least 25 people died and several remain trapped in homes in Petit-Goáve, Haiti, after a river was flooded by the powerful storm, Mayor Jean Bertrans Subrème told the Associated Press.
“I am overwhelmed by the situation,” Subrème said, adding that he’d requested assistance from the government.
At least three other deaths, including two caused by a landslide, were also reported in Haiti in relation to Hurricane Melissa, the Haitian Civil Protection Agency confirmed in a statement. At least one person has died in the Dominican Republic, according to officials, who confirmed more than 1,000 others were evacuated or displaced via CNN.
Melissa made landfall in Cuba Wednesday (October 29) morning as an “extremely dangerous” Category 3, the National Hurricane Center in Miami confirmed via NBC News. The storm, which had previously made landfall in Jamaica on Tuesday (October 27) as a Category 5, was reported to have sustained winds of 120 MPH while making landfall near the city of Chivirico in the Santiago de Cuba province on Wednesday.
Severe flooding was reported as heavy rains and strong winds hit the province, with more than 750,000 residents had evacuated their homes across the country. Hurricane Melissa had previously reached maximum sustained winds of 185 MPH, which tied with the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935 and Hurricane Dorian in 2019 in the Caribbean and the second-highest wind speed recorded in the Atlantic, behind only Hurricane Allen in 1980, when it made landfall in Jamaica as a Category 5 at around 1:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday.
The storm was downgraded to Category 4 at 4:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday and a Category 3 early Wednesday morning. Jamaica was reported to have “suffered major impact” after the hurricane made landfall, with at least two or three hospitals suffering severe damage and housing expected to be “severely impacted” in the storm’s path, Prime Minister Andrew Holness said via NBC News.
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