Zimbabwe News Update
newzimbabwe
8 min read
BBCThe normal soundtrack that accompanies Jamaican life is silent this morning as many have woken to no electricity.About three-quarters of the island is without power and many parts of its western side are under water, with homes destroyed by strong winds after Hurricane Melissa tore across the island with catastrophic force.As wind and rain lashed through the night, one local official said the destruction resembled “the scene of an apocalypse movie.”With communications crippled, the true scale of the disaster remains unknown.
Prime Minister Andrew Holness declared the island a “disaster area” late Tuesday, warning of “devastating impacts” and “significant damage” to hospitals, homes and businesses.Although no deaths have yet been confirmed, Montego Bay’s mayor Richard Vernon told the BBC his first task at daybreak would be “to check if everybody is alive.”Getty Images Trees had already been uprooted in St.
Catherine before the hurricane made landfallHurricane Melissa, the strongest storm to strike Jamaica in modern history, barrelled across the country on Tuesday, leaving behind a trail of ruin.At its peak, the hurricane sustained winds of 298 km/h (185 mph) – stronger than Hurricane Katrina, which devastated New Orleans in 2005 and killed 1,392 people.“It resembled the scene of an apocalypse movie”, an MP in western Jamaica told Kingston-based journalist Kimone Francis of The Jamaica Gleaner.Francis described the night as “stressful” and “intense”, marked by relentless heavy wind and rain.“You don’t have a connection.
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