\u201cThis extreme rainfall potential, owing to the slow motion, is going to create a catastrophic event here for Jamaica,\u201d NHC Deputy Director Jamie Rhome said in a webcast briefing.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou need to just be wherever you\u2019re going to be and be ready to ride this out for several days.<\/p>\n
\u201cConditions will deteriorate really, really rapidly here in the next few hours. Don\u2019t be out and about after sunset.\u201d<\/p>\n
A 79-year-old man was found dead in the Dominican Republic after being swept away in a stream, local officials said on Saturday local time. A 13-year-old boy was missing.<\/p>\n
In neighbouring Haiti, the civil protection agency reported the deaths of three people caused by storm conditions.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou feel powerless, unable to do anything, just run away and leave everything behind,\u201d Angelita Francisco, a 66-year-old who fled her neighbourhood in the Dominican Republic, told AFP through tears.<\/p>\n
Floodwater had inundated her house, causing her refrigerator to float away. <\/p>\n
\u2018Remain in safe harbour\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cSeek shelter now,\u201d the NHC advised residents of Jamaica. \u201cDamaging winds and heavy rainfall today and on Monday will cause catastrophic and life-threatening flash flooding and numerous landslides before the strongest winds arrive.\u201d<\/p>\n
The international airport in Kingston closed late on Saturday to incoming and departing flights, Jamaican Transport Minister Daryl Vaz said.<\/p>\n
Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness advised fishermen to \u201cremain in safe harbour\u201d. The Jamaica Information Service, a government agency, said that all seaports had been closed.<\/p>\n
Jamaican authorities have closed airports and seaports, urging residents to seek shelter immediately. Photo \/ Ricardo Makyn, AFP<\/p>\n
Melissa was expected to make landfall in Jamaica late Monday or early Tuesday local time, and then again in southeastern Cuba.<\/p>\n
At 1500 GMT, the hurricane was located about 177km south of Kingston and 450km south-southwest of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.<\/p>\n
The Dominican Republic\u2019s emergency operations centre has placed nine of 31 provinces on red alert because of the risk of flash floods, rising rivers and landslides.<\/p>\n
Melissa is the 13th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from early June to late November.<\/p>\n
The last major hurricane to impact Jamaica was Beryl in early July 2024 \u2013 an abnormally strong storm for the time of year.<\/p>\n
Beryl brought downpours and strong winds to Jamaica as it moved past the island\u2019s southern coast, leaving at least four people dead.<\/p>\n
– Agence France-Presse<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThis extreme rainfall potential, owing to the slow motion, is going to create a catastrophic event here for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":102519,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[6127,806,17092,74217,14227,273,19876,2082,54171,46662,7799,9928,1454,702,72957,661,74216,111,139,69,193,17711,17216,74855,530,147,11925,9434,673,74854,74853,3055,102],"class_list":["post-102518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-already","tag-as","tag-caribbean","tag-catastrophic","tag-category","tag-environment","tag-flooding","tag-for","tag-forecasters","tag-headed","tag-heads","tag-hurricane","tag-immediately","tag-it","tag-jamaica","tag-major","tag-melissa","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-other","tag-parts","tag-powerful","tag-predicting","tag-residents","tag-science","tag-seek","tag-shelter","tag-storm","tag-strengthened","tag-strengthens","tag-urging","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102518\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}