Hurricane Melissa has ‘ingredients to be a catastrophic storm’, expert warns
Liz Stephens, professor in climate risks and resilience at University of Reading, said:
Having now intensified to Category 5, slow-moving Hurricane Melissa has all the ingredients to be a catastrophic storm, with devastating storm-surge, extreme winds and unusually high rainfall accumulations.
“Communities in Jamaica will need to prepare for potentially unimaginable impacts, and with climate change fuelling stronger storms with higher rainfall totals, this is a stark example for other countries as to what may be in store for them,” Stephens added.
Hurricane Melissa moves north in the Caribbean Sea towards Jamaica and Cuba in a composite satellite image obtained by Reuters on 27 October 2025. Photograph: CIRA/NOAA/Reuters
Key events
Holness: residents finding some hurricane shelters locked
Richard Luscombe
Residents of Jamaica fleeing to shelters as Hurricane Melissa bears down on the island have been turning up to find themselves locked out, the country’s Prime Minister Andrew Holness has just told an emergency briefing in Kingston.
Andrew Holness, prime minister of Jamaica. Photograph: Rudolph Brown/EPA
Holness said officials needed to make “greater effort” to protect the public during and after the category 5 storm, which is expected to make landfall on the south coast early on Tuesday. He said 881 shelters were expected to be operational, but that there were “areas of concern”:
I am monitoring reports that persons have turned up at the shelters… but, for example, they can’t find the person who should open the shelter with the key. They know it should happen, but they’re just not on spot.
We have to strengthen this part of our preparedness, of getting the shelter managers to not wait until someone is coming. Once we activate the shelter, it should be open and ready for persons to come in, even if no one comes.
Holness was speaking at the headquarters of Jamaica’s office of disaster preparedness and emergency management (Opdem). He said crews were scrambling to ensure sufficient food was available in the shelters:
The government is not telling you that everything is perfect. There is no plan that is perfect except the plan of God, and man is fallible, so errors will be made. But that is not an excuse.
In a time of disaster, we must take a zero fail approach to the systems that we are building. So in as much as I’m talking to the public, I’m also talking to the heads of the institutions that are gathered here. Make greater effort to ensure that there is zero fail in our operations.
Here is a graphic that shows the probability of hurricane-force winds across a five-day forecast:
Hanna Mcleod, a 23-year-old hotel receptionist in the Jamaican capital of Kingston, said she will have to work during the hurricane, but that her husband and brother will be at her house, where they boarded the windows and she left candles and flashlights scattered throughout.
“I just told them to keep the door closed,” she told the Associated Press. “I am definitely worried. This is actually the first time I’ll be experiencing this type of hurricane.”
Mcleod said she bought her favorite canned food, corned beef, but that other members of her family prefer mackerel, “so I got a lot of those.”
Natricia Duncan
On Sunday, Jamaica’s prime minister Andrew Holness said that the country has a sound strategy to ensure speedy recovery from the storm.
As he reiterated the serious nature of the threat and urged people to heed life-saving advice to seek shelter and evacuate the most threatened area, he asked the predominantly Christian nation to pray.
“Reach out to your neighbour, check on the elderly, check on persons with disabilities, and anyone who may need help. That is who we are, a people who live by the principle, each one, help one. While we must prepare for the worst, let us also pray for the best. In every adversity, we have found strength, not only in our resilience, but in the power of prayer.
“Wherever you are, I encourage you to gather your family and pray for protection, for calm, and for each other, trusting that God, who has seen Jamaica through every storm, will carry us safely through this one too.
“My Jamaican family, we will weather this storm, and when the sky is clear, we will come together to restore and build stronger, prouder, and more resilient than before. Keep safe everyone, may God bless you, protect your families, and keep safe our beloved Jamaica land we love,” he said.
Natricia Duncan
Thompson also blamed the rapid intensification of the hurricane to climate change.
He said: “Moving from a category one hurricane to a category 4 and possibly becoming a category 5 hurricane by the time we go through tonight. That is something that would not always happen and this is usually indicative of the kind of warm waters that we’re experiencing that we believe is somewhat related to climate change.
“We can’t attribute everything to climate change but many of the things that we are seeing with the blow up of the system and it occurring more frequently from year to year, I think is a good sign that something is changing with our climate and it’s quite likely because of some of the activities that we as humans are engaged in,” he said.
Here are some more photos from Jamaica as Hurricane Melissa approaches the island:
Hurricane Melissa approaches, in Jamaica A person looks at the sea as Hurricane Melissa approaches, in Port Royal, Jamaica, October 27, 2025. Photograph: Octavio Jones/ReutersHurricane Melissa approaches, in Jamaica Palm trees sway in the wind as Hurricane Melissa approaches, in Port Royal, Jamaica, October 27, 2025. Photograph: Octavio Jones/ReutersA structure stands on the sand ahead of Hurricane Melissa at Hellshire Beach, in the coastal town of Hellshire, Jamaica, October 26, 2025. Photograph: Octavio Jones/Reuters
Natricia Duncan
Principal director of the Meteorological Service of Jamaica, Evan Thompson has been warning that it is likely that no part of Jamaica will be spared from the effects of the monster hurricane, whose deadly combination of rapid intensification and snail-paced advancement is a recipe for a catastrophic, record-breaking natural disaster.
“If it continues as projected in terms of the turn toward the island we should therefore on Tuesday look for the hurricane force winds starting to impact southern coastal areas and then gradually spreading as the system moves closer to the coastline. Then we will have intense shower activity surrounding the eye – so mainly in the western part of the island and extending over central parish as well,” he said.
He expects the centre to be off the northern coastline on Wednesday and to start to move away but the rainfall should continue over much of the island, he said.
Thompson said that it is too soon to say that slow-moving, intense hurricanes is an emerging trend in the Caribbean.
“It happened with hurricane Dorian in 2019 and others where we had systems slow to a halt. “This one really has been moving so slowly for a long time but I don’t believe it’s a trend, (it’s) just how this situation has turned out.”
Dorian had reached record wind speed of 185 mph, causing billions of dollars worth of destruction in the Bahamas and claiming 78 lives, with at least 282 people who were never accounted for, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
Natricia Duncan
On Saturday the Guardian spoke with residents in Port Royal, a small fishing village in Kingston. Before a 1692 earthquake submerged most of it, it was one of the biggest cities in the Caribbean. Today, it is considered one of the most hurricane vulnerable communities and is on the compulsory evacuation list.
But residents said they were confident they were prepared to face the hurricane and did not want to move because they do not feel safe in shelters, where their belongings could be stolen and women were at risk.
The Guardian has also heard, but has not been able to confirm, that people have turned up to shelters that were supposed to be activated but found that they were closed.
“I think many of those residents need an assurance that there is going to be some kind of watch over their properties, their assets. They don’t want to leave and come back and can’t find it and I believe that’s one of the main things is the attachment they have.
“So if we can assure them that there will be systems in place to ensure they do not suffer that kind of consequence I think more would be encouraged to move,” principal director of the Meteorological Service of Jamaica, Evan Thompson told the Guardian.
Thompson has been warning that it is likely that no part of Jamaica will be spared from the effects of the monster hurricane, whose deadly combination of rapid intensification and snail-paced advancement is a recipe for a catastrophic, record-breaking natural disaster.
Here is an updated satellite image of the hurricane’s possible route:
Hurricane Melissa has ‘ingredients to be a catastrophic storm’, expert warns
Liz Stephens, professor in climate risks and resilience at University of Reading, said:
Having now intensified to Category 5, slow-moving Hurricane Melissa has all the ingredients to be a catastrophic storm, with devastating storm-surge, extreme winds and unusually high rainfall accumulations.
“Communities in Jamaica will need to prepare for potentially unimaginable impacts, and with climate change fuelling stronger storms with higher rainfall totals, this is a stark example for other countries as to what may be in store for them,” Stephens added.
Hurricane Melissa moves north in the Caribbean Sea towards Jamaica and Cuba in a composite satellite image obtained by Reuters on 27 October 2025. Photograph: CIRA/NOAA/Reuters
As we mentioned in an earlier post, category 5 is the highest category on the Saffir-Simpson scale, which means sustained winds exceeding 157 mph (250 kph).
Hurricane Melissa would be the strongest hurricane in recorded history to directly hit Jamaica, according to Jonathan Porter, chief meteorologist at AccuWeather.
