Hurricane Melissa hit Jamaica on Tuesday.\u00a0 At 2:00 p.m. EDT on Tuesday the center of Hurricane Melissa was located at latitude 18.2\u00b0N and longitude 78.0\u00b0W which put the center about 20 miles 305 km) south-southwest of Montego Bay, Jamaica.\u00a0 Melissa was moving toward the north-northeast at 8 m.p.h. (13 km\/h). The maximum sustained wind speed was 165 m.p.h. (265 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 195 m.p.h. (315 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 899 mb.<\/p>\n
A Hurricane Warning is in effect for Jamaica.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Hurricane Warnings are in effect for the Cuban provinces of Granma, Santiago de Cuba, Guantanamo, Holguin, and Las Tunas.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Hurricane Warnings are in effect for the Central Bahamas and the Southeastern Bahamas.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for Haiti.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for the Cuban province of Camaguey.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for the Turks and Caicos.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Hurricane Melissa was at Category 5 on the Saffir-Simpson Scale at the time of landfall.\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 185 m.p.h. (300 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 892 mb.<\/p>\n The Hurricane Intensity Index (HII) for Hurricane Melissa at the time of landfall was 44.1.\u00a0 The Hurricane Size Index (HSI) was 11.4 and the Hurricane Wind Intensity Size Index (HWISI) was 55.5.\u00a0 Hurricane Melissa was similar in size and intensity to Hurricane Dorian when Dorian hit the Bahamas in 2019.<\/p>\n Hurricane Melissa was still a Category 5 hurricane on Tuesday afternoon.\u00a0 A circular eye with a diameter of 17 miles (28 km) was at the center of Melissa\u2019s circulation.\u00a0 The eye was surrounded by a ring of thunderstorms and the strongest winds were occurring in that ring of storms.\u00a0 Bands of showers and thunderstorms were revolving around the center of Hurricane Melissa.\u00a0 Storms near the center of Melissa generated strong upper level divergence that pumped large quantities of mass away from the hurricane.\u00a0 The removal of large amounts of mass in the upper levels was nearly balanced by a strong inflow of mass in the lower levels of the atmosphere.\u00a0 The near balance of inflow and outflow of mass caused the surface pressure to remain nearly very low during the past few hours.<\/p>\n Winds to hurricane force extended out 30 miles (50 km) from the center of Hurricane Melissa.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out 195 miles (315 km) in the eastern half of Melissa\u2019s circulation.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out 90 miles (145 km) in the western side of Hurricane Melissa.<\/p>\n An upper level trough over the southeastern U.S. will steer Hurricane Melissa toward the northeast during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 On its anticipated track, the core of Hurricane Melissa will l move northeast across Jamaica.\u00a0 Melissa will reach eastern Cuba early on Wednesday.\u00a0 Hurricane Melissa will be over the Bahamas on Wednesday evening.<\/p>\n Hurricane Melissa will drop very heavy rain on Jamaica, Haiti and parts of the Dominican Republic.\u00a0 Very heavy rain is likely to cause catastrophic floods in some locations.\u00a0 Hurricane Melissa will also produce very strong winds in Jamaica.\u00a0 Melissa will be capable of causing severe damage.\u00a0 Widespread electricity outages are likely.\u00a0 Infrastructure and transportation are likely to be severely damaged.\u00a0 Melissa could produce a storm surge of up to 16 feet (5 meters) along the south coast of Jamaica.<\/p>\n Hurricane Melissa will also bring strong winds and locally heavy rain to eastern Cuba, the Central and Southeastern Bahamas, and the Turks and Caicos.\u00a0 Heavy rain is likely to cause flash floods in some locations.\u00a0 Widespread electricity outages are also likely in eastern Cuba.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hurricane Melissa hit Jamaica on Tuesday.\u00a0 At 2:00 p.m. EDT on Tuesday the center of Hurricane Melissa was located at latitude 18.2\u00b0N and longitude 78.0\u00b0W which put the center about 20 miles 305 km) south-southwest of Montego Bay, Jamaica.\u00a0 Melissa was moving toward the north-northeast at 8 m.p.h. (13 km\/h). The maximum sustained wind speed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2],"tags":[528,527,2337,3787,145,144,2591,2167,26,2590,4010,650,448,2589,1733,2609,2592,2587,30],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23490"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23490"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23493,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23490\/revisions\/23493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}