Tropical Storm Melissa is plodding through the central Caribbean, with forecasters warning it could soon strengthen and brush past Jamaica as a powerful hurricane

Tropical Storm Melissa formed in the Caribbean Sea on Tuesday morning. Melissa is the 13th named storm of the 2025 Atlantic Hurricane Season. At 2 p.m., the National Hurricane Center showed that Melissa had sustained winds of 50 mph and was moving west at 14 mph. The storm was moving over very warm waters.

Hurricane Melissa is expected to weaken into an extratropical cyclone on Friday, Oct. 31, the National Hurricane Center said.

Tropical Storm Melissa is lumbering through the Caribbean Sea and bringing a risk of dangerous landslides and life-threatening flooding to Jamaica and southern Hispaniola.

The storm was making its way to the Bahamas and Bermuda on Thursday morning as Jamaica confronted the devastation from one of the most potent storms ever recorded anywhere.

Hurricane Melissa hit Jamaica as a Category 5. Cuban authorities reported that about 735,000 people have been evacuated so far.

Hurricane Melissa, the strongest tropical cyclone of 2025, disrupts Caribbean travel, closing airports and causing widespread flight cancellations.

Hurricane Melissa on Monday intensified into a Category 5 storm, the most powerful of hurricanes, while continuing to drop torrents of “catastrophic” rain across the Caribbean, the