Hurricane Melissa impact on Florida, Guantanamo Bay: Check latest forecast of Category 4 storm which may become Category 5

Melissa is now a Category 4 hurricane and could intensify to a Category 5 as it nears Jamaica, according to the latest forecast update from the weather department. Melissa is the 13th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from early June to late November. The last major hurricane to impact Jamaica was Beryl in early July 2024 -- an abnormally strong storm for the time of year.

The Navy began evacuating hundreds of U.S. citizens and their pets to Florida from the Navy base at Guantánamo Bay on Saturday, days before the possible arrival of a major hurricane in that portion of eastern Cuba. More than 4,000 people live on the base, about one-fourth of them active-duty sailors and soldiers. The rest include Navy families, kindergarten through high school teachers, hospital staff and hundreds of Jamaican and Filipino workers on long-term Defense Department contracts.

The National Hurricane Center said Saturday that Tropical Storm Melissa had intensified into a hurricane. Projections from the center Saturday afternoon showed that Melissa could go through Jamaica on Monday as a major hurricane and reach Guantánamo Bay before dawn Wednesday.


The U.S. military chartered four commercial airplanes and was sending a C-17 cargo plane from Charleston, South Carolina, to Guantánamo to remove approximately 1,000 military members, family members and other civilians from the base this weekend, Navy Capt. John Fage said Saturday.

What about Florida?

The timing of when the storm decides to turn to the northeast will have a big impact on the forecast. The earlier it does so, the more likely the storm is to leave the United States unscathed. The later it makes the turn, the more likely effects on the United States become -- but that is not likely at this moment.

With inherent uncertainty in the exact track, forecasters with the Weather Prediction Center wrote on Friday that Melissa was not expected to significantly affect the U.S. East Coast "outside of some waves and rip currents." But they warned that because so much of the track depended on an unformed system over the eastern United States, Melissa was still worth monitoring for any potential changes.

FAQs

Q1. What is current status of Hurricane Melissa?
A1. Melissa is now a Category 4 hurricane and could intensify to a Category 5.

Q2. Which agency predicts about Hurricane?
A2. The National Hurricane Center.