After making landfall in Jamaica on Tuesday and a second landfall in Cuba early Wednesday, Hurricane Melissa is now moving northeast into the Atlantic Ocean.
As of 11 a.m. ET, Melissa remained a Category 2 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 100 mph. It was located around 150 miles south of the central Bahamas, moving northeast at 14 mph.
As the storm moves north, the National Hurricane Center continues to warn of dangerous winds and extreme rainfall for Cuba and the Bahamas.
“On the forecast track, the core of Melissa is expected to move further offshore of Eastern Cuba this morning, move across the southeastern or central Bahamas today, and pass near or to the west of Bermuda late Thursday and Thursday night,” the NHC said in its latest advisory.
In eastern Cuba, heavy rainfall “will cause life-threatening and potentially catastrophic flash flooding with numerous landslides,” according to meteorologists.
The NHC is warning that storm surge of 4 to 7 feet “above normally dry ground is possible in the southeastern Bahamas today, and minor coastal flooding is possible in the Turks and Caicos Islands today.”
Melissa has been blamed for at least 33 deaths across Jamaica, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. In Jamaica, at least three people died before Melissa’s arrival, and officials on Wednesday said a tree fell on an infant after the storm made landfall. At least three people were killed by the storm in Haiti over the weekend, and a fourth died in the Dominican Republic.
In Haiti, at least 25 people have died, according to the mayor of Petit-Goâve, who said the banks of the La Digue river burst and flooded homes nearby.
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