Hurricane Melissa was hitting eastern Cuba hard early Wednesday after slamming Jamaica as a Category 5 storm. Maps show its forecast path.

Hurricane Melissa tore a path of destruction across Jamaica on Tuesday, prompting the prime minister to declare the country a disaster area, after the storm made landfall as a Category 5 hurricane, one of the most powerful landfalls on record in the Atlantic basin.

The storm left widespread destruction and at least dozens of deaths in its path. In Chicago, people are looking for ways to help.

Melissa made landfall Tuesday in Jamaica as a catastrophic Category 5 storm with top winds of 185 mph, one of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes on record, before moving onto Cuba. But even countries outside the direct path of the massive storm, like Haiti and the Dominican Republic, felt its devastating impact.

Melissa is the first major natural disaster to hit the Caribbean since the Trump administration dismantled USAID, typically the lead agency in responding with foreign hurricane assistance.

New York chef Kemoy Gordon last spoke to his cousin in Jamaica on Monday, as his family prepared to leave their beachside home on the western part of the Caribbean island ahead of Hurricane Melissa. That was the last time he made contact with them.

Paula Robinson, who lives in Preston, has eleven members of her family living in Jamaica, including her mum, who she last spoke to on Monday. She said her mum told her "'if I never hear your voice again, just know I love you". "I told her you are going to hear my voice again!'"

Hurricane Melissa, the most powerful storm of the 2025 Atlantic season, made landfall in Jamaica Tuesday as possibly its worst storm in recorded history.