Strong winds in Hurricane Melissa battered eastern Cuba early on Wednesday.\u00a0 At 8:00 a.m. EDT on Wednesday the center of Hurricane Melissa was located at latitude 20.6\u00b0N and longitude 75.7\u00b0W which put the center about 45 miles (75 km) northwest of Guantanamo, Cuba.\u00a0 Melissa was moving toward the north-northeast at 14 m.p.h. (22 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 105 m.p.h. (165 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 125 m.p.h. (200 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 968 mb.<\/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 <\/strong>Bahamas.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n A Hurricane Watch is in effect for Bermuda.<\/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 After leaving a trail of destruction in Jamaica, Hurricane Melissa battered eastern Cuba early on Wednesday.\u00a0 Melissa was still a major hurricane at the time is made the center of circulation landfall in the province of Santiago de Cuba.\u00a0 Melissa started to weaken slowly again after the center moved over land.<\/p>\n Hurricane Melissa was still a powerful storm on Wednesday morning.\u00a0 Winds to hurricane force extended out 30 miles (50 km) from the center of Melissa’s circulation.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out 185 miles (300 km) in the eastern half of Melissa\u2019s circulation.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out 105 miles (165 km) in the western side of Hurricane Melissa.<\/p>\n The Hurricane Intensity Index (HII) for Hurricane Melissa at the time of landfall was 17.8.\u00a0 The Hurricane Size Index (HSI) was 11.9 and the Hurricane Wind Intensity Size Index (HWISI) was 29.7. Hurricane Melissa was similar in size and intensity to Hurricane Sally when Sally hit South Alabama in 2020.<\/p>\n Hurricane Melissa will move through an environment marginally favorable for intensification during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 Melissa will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperatures are near 28\u00b0C.\u00a0 It will move under the southeastern part of an upper level trough over the eastern U.S.\u00a0 The upper level trough will produce southwesterly winds that will blow toward the top of Melissa’s circulation.\u00a0 Those winds will cause the vertical wind shear to increase.\u00a0 The vertical wind shear will inhibit intensification.\u00a0 Hurricane Melissa is likely to maintain its intensity during the next 24 hours after it moves northeast of Cuba.<\/p>\n The upper level trough will steer Hurricane Melissa toward the northeast during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 On its anticipated track, Melissa will move northeast of Cuba during the next few hours.\u00a0 Hurricane Melissa will move over the Bahamas later today.\u00a0 Melissa will be near Bermuda on Thursday night.<\/p>\n Hurricane Melissa will continue to bring strong winds and heavy rain to eastern Cuba during the next few hours.\u00a0 Heavy rain is likely to cause flash floods in some location.\u00a0 Widespread electricity outages are likely in eastern Cuba.\u00a0 Melissa will also bring strong winds and heavy rain to the Bahamas later today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Strong winds in Hurricane Melissa battered eastern Cuba early on Wednesday.\u00a0 At 8:00 a.m. EDT on Wednesday the center of Hurricane Melissa was located at latitude 20.6\u00b0N and longitude 75.7\u00b0W which put the center about 45 miles (75 km) northwest of Guantanamo, Cuba.\u00a0 Melissa was moving toward the north-northeast at 14 m.p.h. (22 km\/h).\u00a0 The […]<\/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":[528,527,31,3787,145,2591,2167,26,2590,4010,650,448,2589,1733,2592,2587,30],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23498"}],"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=23498"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23498\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23499,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23498\/revisions\/23499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}