Hurricane Melissa, a powerful Category 5 storm with winds nearing 185 mph (298 km/h) and more than three feet of rainfall in some areas, struck Jamaica and parts of Cuba at a time when decades of deforestation had already destabilized local terrain. Nearly half of Jamaica’s landscape is considered landslide-prone, with 30% marked as extremely high risk—conditions worsened by the loss of forest cover that once held fragile slopes together. With hillsides stripped for farming, settlements, and road building, the storm’s intense rainfall rapidly saturated soils, dramatically increasing the likelihood of slope failures.
The impacts were immediate and severe. Landslides cut off major roads in St. Elizabeth’s Santa Cruz region, power outages spread across 77% of the island, and more than 25,000 people sought emergency shelter. Experts say the combination of weakened hillsides, extreme rain, and human-driven landscape changes created a perfect setup for widespread landslides and flash flooding. As recovery begins, the disaster exposes how environmental degradation is amplifying the destructive power of climate-fueled storms. More