Relief Begins To Arrive As Jamaica, Haiti And Cuba Dig Out From Hurricane Melissa's Destruction November 2, 2025 at 9:25 PM 9 Rescuers and aid workers fanned out across Jamaica on Saturday to distribute food and water and reach communities still isolated four days after Hurricane Melissa hit the island. Essential relief supplies are now rolling into hurricanestricken St. Elizabeth and Westmoreland, most of which had been cut off by fallen concrete posts and trees strewn across roads.
- - Relief Begins To Arrive As Jamaica, Haiti And Cuba Dig Out From Hurricane Melissa's Destruction
November 2, 2025 at 9:25 PM
9
Rescuers and aid workers fanned out across Jamaica on Saturday to distribute food and water and reach communities still isolated four days after Hurricane Melissa hit the island.
Essential relief supplies are now rolling into hurricane-stricken St. Elizabeth and Westmoreland, most of which had been cut off by fallen concrete posts and trees strewn across roads.
But in some parts, people were forced to dip buckets into rivers, collecting the muddy water for everyday use, while others have been drinking coconut water and roasting breadfruit.
In Westmoreland, mangled metal sheets, splintered wooden frames of houses and fragments of furniture littered the coastline.
Social Security Minister Pearnel Charles Jr. was among several convoys of emergency responders en route to deliver ready-to-eat meals, water, tarpaulins, blankets, medicine and other essentials.
"The priority now is to get help to those who need it," said Charles Jr. during a brief stop en route to Black River for the first time with long-awaited relief supplies. Prime Minister Andrew Holness had declared Black River ground zero and said the town will have to be rebuilt.
(MORE: How To Help Those Impacted By Hurricane Melissa)
Photo by RICARDO MAKYN/AFP via Getty Images
"The entire Jamaica is really broken because of what has happened," Education Minister Dana Morris Dixon said.
Officials said at least 28 people have died in Jamaica, including a child, and they expected the death toll to keep rising. In one isolated community, residents pleaded with officials to remove the body of one victim tangled in a tree. On Thursday, dozens of U.S. search-and-rescue experts landed in Jamaica along with their dogs.
More than 13,000 people remained crowded into shelters, with 60% of the island without power and only 35% of mobile phone sites in operation, officials said. People clutched cash as they formed long lines at the few gas stations and supermarkets open in affected areas.
"We understand the frustration, we understand your anxiety, but we ask for your patience," said Daryl Vaz, Jamaica's telecommunications and energy minister.
Water trucks have been mobilized to serve many of Jamaica's rural communities that are not connected to the government's utility system, Water Minister Matthew Samuda said.
Slow Recovery In Cuba
In Cuba, heavy equipment began to clear blocked roads and highways and the military helped rescue people trapped in isolated communities and at risk from landslides.
No deaths were reported after the Civil Defense evacuated more than 735,000 people across eastern Cuba ahead of the storm.
Melissa's passage could worsen challenges in feeding Cubans. The country faces a severe economic crisis and spends some $2 billion annually importing food products.
Local officials said there was damage to plantain, corn and cassava crops, coffee, various vegetables and trees across the five affected eastern provinces.
Government officials said Melissa's heavy rainfall did benefit dams and reservoirs, after the eastern part of the country had been suffering from a severe drought and water shortage.
"That is one of the silver linings," said Margarita Fernandez, executive director of the Caribbean Agroecology Institute in Vermont. CAI is raising funds to send directly to farmers and cooperatives there. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization also delivered seed to Cuba ahead of the storm, a spokesperson said.
(MORE: Streets Of 500-Year-Old City Filled With Rubble)
The town of El Cobre in the eastern province of Santiago de Cuba was one of the hardest hit. Home to some 7,000 people, it is also the site of the Basilica of Our Lady of Charity, the patron saint of Cuba who is deeply venerated by Catholics and practitioners of Santería, an Afro-Cuban religion.
"We went through this very badly. So much wind, so much wind. Zinc roofs were torn off. Some houses completely collapsed. It was a disaster," said Odalys Ojeda, a 61-year-old retiree, as she looked up at the sky from her living room where the roof and other parts of the house were torn away.
AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa
Even the basilica wasn't spared.
Here at the sanctuary, the carpentry, stained glass and even the masonry suffered extensive damage," Father Rogelio Dean Puerta said.
A televised Civil Defense meeting chaired by President Miguel Díaz-Canel did not provide an official estimate of the damage. However, officials from the affected provinces — Santiago, Granma, Holguín, Guantánamo, and Las Tunas — reported losses of roofs, power lines and fiber optic telecommunications cables, as well as roads cut off, isolating communities, and heavy losses in banana, cassava and coffee plantations.
Many communities were still without electricity, internet and telephone service because of downed transformers and power lines.
In an unusual statement Thursday, the U.S. State Department said the United States was "ready to assist the Cuban people." It said the U.S. "is prepared to provide immediate humanitarian assistance directly and through local partners who can deliver it more effectively to those in need."
The statement did not specify how the cooperation would be coordinated or whether contact had been made with the Cuban government, with which it maintains a bitter conflict that includes six decades of economic and financial sanctions.
Death And Flooding In Haiti
Melissa also unleashed catastrophic flooding in Haiti, where at least 31 people were reported killed and 20 others were missing, mostly in the country's southern region. Some 15,000 people also remained in shelters.
"It is a sad moment for the country," said Laurent Saint-Cyr, president of Haiti's transitional presidential council.
He said officials expect the death toll to rise and noted that the government was mobilizing resources to search for people and provide emergency relief.
AP Photo/Odelyn Joseph
Steven Guadard said Melissa killed his entire family in Petit-Goâve, including four children ranging in age from 1 month to 8 years.
Michelet Dégange, who has lived in Petit-Goâve for three years, said Melissa left him homeless.
"There is no place to rest the body; we are hungry," he said. "The authorities don't think about us. I haven't closed my eyes since the bad weather began."
(MORE: Melissa Compounds Misery In Haiti)
When Melissa came ashore in Jamaica as a Category 5 hurricane with top winds of 185 mph (295 kph) on Tuesday, it tied strength records for Atlantic hurricanes making landfall, both in wind speed and barometric pressure.
Melissa was a Category 2 storm with top sustained winds near 105 mph Thursday night and was moving northeast at 32 mph, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami. The hurricane was centered about 260 miles west-southwest of Bermuda.
(MORE: Homes Flattened In The Bahamas)
Melissa brushed past the southeast Bahamas on Wednesday, forcing officials to evacuate 1,400 people ahead of the storm.
Melissa was forecast to pass near or to the west of Bermuda late Thursday and may strengthen further before weakening Friday.
Bermuda's international airport was to close Thursday evening and reopen Friday at noon, while all schools on the wealthy British territory were ordered closed.
Source: "AOL Breaking"
Source: Breaking
Published: November 02, 2025 at 03:55PM on Source: GETTY MAG
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