{"id":233978,"date":"2025-10-30T12:27:16","date_gmt":"2025-10-30T12:27:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/233978\/"},"modified":"2025-10-30T12:27:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-30T12:27:16","slug":"satellite-images-reveal-hurricane-destruction-in-jamaicas-towns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/233978\/","title":{"rendered":"Satellite images reveal hurricane destruction in Jamaica&#8217;s towns"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Before and after: Jamaican town &#8216;totally destroyed&#8217; by hurricanepublished at 11:19 GMT<\/p>\n<p>11:19 GMT<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-8kvzjk-Contributor etflsgg2\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/24d2d5d4-d458-4196-aaee-113790d4fafc.png.webp.webp\" width=\"64\" height=\"64\" class=\"ssrcss-11yxrdo-Image edrdn950\"\/>Thomas Copeland<br \/>BBC Verify Live journalist<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">This morning I\u2019ve been reviewing the latest satellite imagery from Jamaica which reveals the scale of devastation left behind by Hurricane Melissa, which killed four people as it ripped across the island yesterday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The town of Black River on the island\u2019s south-west coast &#8220;has literally been totally destroyed&#8221; by the category five storm, Jamaica&#8217;s PM Andrew Holness told the BBC. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In these side-by-side comparisons of satellite pictures from before and after Melissa struck we can see the impact right where the Black River flows into the Caribbean. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In this first wider view it\u2019s clear most of the buildings in the town have been heavily damaged and there\u2019s debris lining every street. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In the bottom right you can see that the Black River has burst its banks and along the waterline sediment runoff has left a brown strip of muddy water. <\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Before and after satellite images of Black River, with the after picture showing huge damage to the town's buildings and the river having flooded.\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3fe90d59-ba1e-4681-9d93-5849e76b33e0.png.webp.webp\"  width=\"708\" height=\"929\" class=\"ssrcss-11yxrdo-Image edrdn950\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">When we zoom in closer to the town centre we can identify specific buildings. The large white building in the middle is the Black River Market &#8211; its roof has been ripped clean off. The same has happened to the orange roof of a warehouse at the top right.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The fire station to the right of the market in this picture appears to be still standing but badly damaged. Most other buildings here in the town centre are in far worse shape, like the soul food cafe just above the market  &#8211; it looks like it\u2019s gone entirely. <\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Before and after satellite images of Black River, with the after picture showing huge damage to the town's buildings.\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/5169f6a5-91da-42ce-b05b-b28966e487b1.png.webp.webp\"  width=\"707\" height=\"931\" class=\"ssrcss-11yxrdo-Image edrdn950\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before and after: Jamaican town &#8216;totally destroyed&#8217; by hurricanepublished at 11:19 GMT 11:19 GMT Thomas CopelandBBC Verify Live&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":228331,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-233978","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233978\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/228331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}