Hurricane Melissa, which is stronger than Hurricane Katrina, is set to bring catastrophic winds, flash flooding and high storm surges to the island of Jamaica.

Powerful Category 5 Hurricane Melissa made landfall in Jamaica on Tuesday afternoon as one of the most powerful hurricanes on record, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Members of Waterloo region's Caribbean association say they are feeling anxious and optimistic as Hurricane Melissa, a Category 5 storm, made landfall in Jamaica Tuesday afternoon.

The National Hurricane Center said this morning that Hurricane Melissa made landfall on the southern coast of Cuba as an "extremely dangerous" Category 3 storm, with winds of 120 mph. The storm hit near the city of Chivirico in the Cuban province of Santiago de Cuba.

Hurricane Melissa is moving slowly. It reached the coast of Jamaica this afternoon after stalling out over the Caribbean Sea for the past two days. And yet, the winds that form Melissa are shockingly fast.

Lightning flashes in the eyewall of Category 5 Melissa are a marker of how strong the storm is. It reached a central pressure of 892 millibars, among the lowest ever recorded in the Atlantic Ocean. It is tied as the third-most intense Atlantic storm with the devastating 1935 Labor Day hurricane.

Celebrity Beyond’s Oct. 26 itinerary will visit the Western Caribbean rather than the Eastern Caribbean, according to the cruise line’s parent company, Royal Caribbean Group. The ship will visit Costa Maya in Mexico, Belize and Roatan, Honduras.

Today, Today, several developments occurred. Melissa changed into hurricane, before turning into a Category 5 hurricane. Then, it weakened to a Category 4 hurricane and eventually became a Category 3 hurricane before being downgraded to a Category 3 hurricane with sustained winds of 125 mph.