Category 5 Melissa on final approach to Jamaica

Melissa crawled north over the past day, sitting about 35 miles from the coast of Jamaica at sunrise Tuesday. It is beginning to speed up. Landfall — the center of the eye hitting shore — is expected midday. While there are some signs of an eye wall replacement, which can slightly weaken a storm, no weakening is evident yet and it seemingly won’t have enough time to fall below Category 5 ahead of impact.

Weather watch

Melissa. Hurricane Melissa had an incredible central pressure of 901 millibars to go with its sustained wind of 175 mph early this morning, ranking eighth all time for low pressure in the Atlantic. It is forecast to come ashore with sustained winds of 165 mph or greater a bit west-northwest of Treasure Beach. Structural collapse, trees stripped of leaves and widespread power outages will occur from winds as other damage occurs from storm surge of 9-13 feet, and flooding or landslides. On Wednesday Melissa should strike eastern Cuba, perhaps still as a Category 4, in a relatively rural area west of the country’s second-largest city Santiago de Cuba.

Investigating without pay. NOAA Hurricane hunters will make at least one more visit into the storm this morning before it makes landfall. On Monday night my colleague at the Post traveled with them into the eye. It is worth remembering that those flying these missions, and the folks working at NOAA/NWS offices across the country, are working without being paid due to the government shutdown.

Lightning links

Jamaica news sources: The Gleaner | Jamaica Observer

Inside The Eye Of Hurricane Melissa. (The Weather Channel)

How rarely do Category 4 or 5 hurricanes make landfall? (Me, The Washington Post)

East Coast to face rough surf, wet weather and cooler conditions to end October. (Elizabeth Danco, AccuWeather)

Over 20 'ill-prepared' hikers rescued from snowy Mount Washington: Officials. (Megan Forrester, ABC)

Tropical season to finish above average

Driven by three Category 5 hurricanes, 2025 will finish above average for Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE).

Numbers from Colorado State show how Melissa has boosted the season to above average readings for the date and also closing in on average for a whole season. With several days of Melissa to go, the season will finish above average in this metric, even without any more storms.

It was widely expected to be another in a string of above average years in the tropics. Melissa is the 13th named storm while average for named storms is 14. Although storm numbers are not extreme, the trio of Cat 5s is. Only the historic season of 2025 had more, by one.

The United States has ended up rather lucky with missing all the intense activity. Tropical Storm Chantal is the only direct hit, back in July in the Carolinas.

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Weekday morning newsletter by a journalist/forecaster. Connecting weather and climate change dots while occasionally stirring the pot.

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