Washington.- Melissa It became a category 1 hurricane this Saturday in the Caribbean, where it is expected to rapidly gain intensity until it becomes a dangerous storm that will bring heavy rains to Jamaica and portions of Hispaniola, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) reported.
The center of Melissa was this afternoon about 230 kilometers southeast of Kingston and about 380 kilometers southwest of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, with sustained winds of 120 kilometers per hour and a slow movement towards the west-northwest at about 2 kilometers per hour, according to the most recent report from the Miami-based center.
Forecasters expect the cyclone to turn north and northeast between Monday and Tuesday. According to the forecast trajectory, the center of Melissa would move near Jamaica during this weekend and the beginning of the next, when it would be located near or over eastern Cuba next Wednesday or Thursday.
Places on alert for Melissa
After leaving at least three dead in Haiti, Melissa is expected to hit Jamaica, the south of the Dominican Republic and Haitian territory in the next few hours with sudden “catastrophic floods” and life-threatening landslides.
Jamaica remains under a hurricane warning, with strong winds forecast as the day progresses. Haiti remains under a heavy rain watch tonight.
Melissa is expected to dump a total of 15 to 25 inches (38 to 63 centimeters) of rain on parts of southern Hispaniola and Jamaica through early next week, with chances of up to 35 inches (89 centimeters) on Haiti’s Tiburon Peninsula.
The NHC also warned of the possibility of heavy rainfall in eastern Cuba.
Before it became a hurricane, it already left more than a million users without drinking water in the Dominican Republic, where flooding was also reported this Friday in several parts of the country and the displacement of hundreds of people in search of refuge.
In Haiti, two people died on Thursday in a landslide in Fontamara, at the southern entrance to Port-au-Prince, while a day earlier a man died after a tree fell in the commune of Marigot.
Intense cyclone season
With Melissa there are now 13 cyclones this year in the Atlantic: hurricanes Erin, Gabrielle, Humberto, Imelda and Melissa, and storms Andrea, Barry, Chantal, Dexter, Fernand, Jerry, Karen and Lorenzo, among which Chantal was the only one to make landfall in the US in July, leaving two dead in North Carolina.
The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has predicted an “above normal” hurricane season, estimating between 13 and 18 tropical storms, of which between five and nine could become hurricanes.
