Hurricane Melissa Now Stronger Than Katrina, Forecasters Warn

Jamaicans are bracing for Hurricane Melissa, which meteorologists and scientists are predicting could be the most destructive storm on record and one of the most powerful Atlantic hurricanes ever recorded. Hurricane Melissa, a Category 5 storm, has sustained winds of around 175 mph with even higher gusts. The associated storm surge could reach up to 13 feet, indicating Hurricane Melissa is stronger than Hurricane Katrina, which made landfall 20 years ago, on August 29, 2005.

While both storms reached sustained winds of 175 mph at their peak, qualifying them as Category 5 hurricanes on the Saffir-Simpson Wind Scale, Katrina made landfall as a Category 3 storm. Melissa is expected to make landfall as a Category 5 between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. ET, the Hurricane Center predicts. In terms of intensity, Melissa’s central pressure of 901 millibars is more intense than Katrina’s 902 millibars at its peak. Lower central pressure indicates a stronger storm.

In the National Hurricane Center’s latest bulletin, forecasters say Hurricane Melissa is expected to bring “catastrophic winds, flash flooding, and storm surge.”

“A Hurricane Warning means that hurricane conditions are expected somewhere within the warning area,” the bulletin reads. “Residents in Jamaica should remain in a safe shelter.  In the warning area in Cuba and the Bahamas, preparations to protect life and property should be rushed to completion.”

The Hurricane Center also says the storm will likely cause structural damage in Jamaica.

Hurricane Melissa Is ‘Storm of the Century,’ Forecasters Warn in Jamaica

Currently, more than 800 shelters have opened across Jamaica to house residents whose homes are affected by flooding and landslides, CNN reported.

“This is reaching the upper echelon, the upper threshold of what nature can produce in this part of the world. We’re in very rare territory for Hurricane Melissa in terms of its strength and pressure,” Meteorologist Derek Van Dam said on CNN News Central.

“It’s a catastrophic situation expected in Jamaica,” the World Meteorological Organization’s tropical cyclone specialist, Anne-Claire Fontan, told a Geneva press briefing. “For Jamaica, it will be the storm of the century for sure.”

The International Federation of the Red Cross estimates that up to 1.5 million people in Jamaica will be directly affected by the storm.

“Today will be very difficult for tens of thousands, if not millions of people in Jamaica,” IFRC’s Necephor Mghendi said from Port of Spain in Trinidad and Tobago. “Roofs will be tested, flood waters will rise, and isolation will become a harsh reality for many.”

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