It has been a rough 24 hours thus far for Jamaica. One of our team members left the territory of St Elizabeth just as the storm ramped up at 11am. There are reports now of two-story buildings under water, which means it is now over ten feet. The weaker buildings are folding (current time 8:15 EST) and the water hasn't begun to come down from the mountains yet: and this will add feet of water per hour through Wednesday. She and her family are relatively safe, having moved 30 miles to the east.
Hurricane Melissa is tormenting Northwest Jamaica after ravishing towns like Black River, Saint Elizabeth and others. We have friends on the ground who aren't trapped have been reporting heavy damage since 11am (current time 8:29pm EST). Catastrophic damage and flooding, that will only get worse as the rain continues to pour and the water comes down from the mountains. The true damage will not be able to be assessed until sunrise unfortunately... but we fear it will be heartbreaking.
We know for sure that the infrastructure is suffering terribly, as most parts aren't as developed as the United States or other well off nations. It was stated on t.v. that preliminary estimates would be over 20 Billion dollars in infrastructural damage. So, the least we can do is make sure that people have a warm meal, dry clothes and hygiene to stave off infections or sickness (since storms like this cause mosquitoes and bacteria colonies).
As this will likely be our only storm serviced this year, we can make a nice impact on the thousands that will be affected, by a continued focus on the island. We have a strong 14-year history of making change in areas that we are able to be attached to and want to be a blessing to them for at least a 6-month period.
