Hurricane Melissa strengthened into a major Category 4 hurricane, with the possibility of intensifying to a Category 5 storm Sunday night, unleashing torrential rain and threatening to cause catastrophic flooding in the northern Caribbean, including Haiti and Jamaica, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
The weather agency added Melissa is likely to reach the southern coast of Jamaica as a major hurricane late Monday or Tuesday morning, and urged people on the island to seek shelter immediately.
“Conditions (in Jamaica) are going to go down rapidly today,” Jamie Rhome, the center’s deputy director, said on Sunday. “Be ready to ride this out for several days.”
Melissa was centered about 110 miles (180 kilometers) south of Kingston, Jamaica, and about 285 miles (460 kilometers) south-southwest of Guantánamo, Cuba, on Sunday morning. It had maximum sustained winds of 140 mph (220 kph) and was moving west at 5 mph (7 kph), the hurricane center said.
Melissa was expected to drop torrential rains of up to 30 inches (760 millimeters) on Jamaica and southern Hispaniola — Haiti and the Dominican Republic — according to the hurricane center. Some areas may see as much as 40 inches (1,010 millimeters) of rain.
It also warned that extensive damage to infrastructure, power and communication outages, and the isolation of communities in Jamaica were to be expected.
Melissa should be near or over Cuba by late Tuesday, where it could bring up to 12 inches (300 millimeters) of rain, before moving toward the Bahamas later Wednesday.
Airports closed and shelters activated
Jamaica's two main airports, the Norman Manley International Airport and the Sangster International Airport in Montego Bay, were closed by Sunday.
Local officials said they were considering enforcing an evacuation order as many residents of low-lying and flood prone areas did not heed advice to evacuate.
"The question of the mandatory movement will soon be addressed,” Desmond McKenzie, who is leading the Jamaican government’s disaster response, said in a press conference. Melissa is forecast to reach Category 5 when it makes landfall along the south coast on Tuesday.
McKenzie also said all the more of 650 shelters in Jamaica are open. Officials said earlier that warehouses across the island were well-stocked and thousands of food packages pre-positioned for quick distribution if needed.
Evan Thompson, the principal director of the Meteorological Service of Jamaica, said the storm surge is expected mainly over the southern side of the island.
“There is potential (for) flooding in every parish of our country," Thompson said. “If you’re in a flood prone, low-lying area, you need to take note. If you’re near a river course or a gully, you need to take special note and find some alternative location that you can move to should you be threatened by the heavy rainfall.”
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Some foreign governments are also preparing for the hurricane's arrival in Jamaica.
The government of Antigua and Barbuda is housing visiting students at a hotel in Kingston. As of Sunday morning, 52 of them had checked in. Students from other islands were staying at the same hotel, though it remained unclear whether they were sponsored by their governments.
“They have a better bounce back regimen here (at the hotel) in terms of standby power and water (in comparison with university dorms," said Jewel Moore, 19, a chemistry student at UWI Mona. She and her fellow students are enjoying snacks and games before the hurricane arrives.
“The passing of the storm should be okay," he added. "It’s getting out that will be a problem.”
The erratic and slow-moving storm has killed at least three people in Haiti and a fourth person in the Dominican Republic, where another person remains missing.
Communities cut off by rising waters
Haitian authorities said three people had died as a consequence of the hurricane and another five were injured due to a collapsed wall. There were also reports of rising river levels, flooding and a bridge destroyed due to breached riverbanks in Sainte-Suzanne, in the northeast.
Many residents are still reluctant to leave their homes, Haitian officials said.
The storm damaged nearly 200 homes in the Dominican Republic and knocked out water supply systems, affecting more than half a million customers. It also downed trees and traffic lights, unleashed a couple of small landslides and left more than two dozen communities isolated by floodwaters.
The Bahamas Department of Meteorology said Melissa could bring tropical storm or hurricane conditions to islands in the southeastern and central Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands by early next week.
Melissa is the 13th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from June 1 to Nov. 30.
The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration had predicted an above-normal season with 13 to 18 named storms.
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Savarese reported from Sao Paulo.
AP writer Anika Kentish contributed to this report from St. John’s Antigua.
