AID FOR JAMAICA (AND HAITI)

disasterous category 5 hurricane melissa is making landfall right now. sounds of explosions, debris flying everywhere and hitting structures, trees bending and snapping, huge drop in air pressure, 180+mph sustained winds reported. and that's west of landfall.

the eye is almost a perfect circle— this storm is unbelievably strong. jamaica is already put through it hard as it is. they're going to need all of the support anybody can give, after this.

wind damage isn't even the worst part. rainfall (30 - 40 inches expected). landslides. storm surges several feet high. major flooding. entire cities will be destroyed. lives are going to be lost and many bodies will almost certainly never be recovered.

https://supportjamaica.gov.jm/
https://www.impactjamaica.org/
https://www.globalgiving.org/

do what you can to help. if all you can do is get the word out, please consider doing so. this hurricane is stronger than katrina. i worry about how much (how little) humanitarian aid is going to happen, since it isn't going to hit the mainland US.

EDIT: LIVESTREAM AND UPDATES.

EDIT 2: haiti is experiencing catastrophic flooding from the hurricane. so far, 20 people have lost their lives and 10 more are missing. donate and support here:

https://hopeforhaiti.com/

https://www.redcross.org/

https://www.coreresponse.org/

as of 12pm (et) on october 29th, no casualties have been reported so far in jamaica, but communications are still down across much of the island, and further rain and flooding are expected to cause more catastrophic damage.

EDIT 3: 7am (et) october 31, at least 49 dead. 

latest from haiti: at least 30 deaths, at least 20 missing, recovery ongoing. 

latest from jamaica: at least 19 deaths, recovery ongoing.

EDIT 4: read this article to get a sense of the devastation in jamaica.

""My community, we have dead bodies there," Mr Walker said.

He said he, like many others in the area, still has not heard from family and doesn't know if they made it out of the storm alive. Mr Walker is stuck in Black River, sleeping in whoever's house is still standing that will accept him, he says, while his eight-year-old son is in Westmoreland, the next parish over.

Westmoreland shares Jamaica's western coast, along with Black River in the St Elizabeth parish, and was also severely damaged by Melissa.

"There's no way of getting to my family to find out if they're OK," he said as his eyes began to swell. Along with the unusable roads making travel difficult, there is little to no cell phone service and no electricity or running water in many hard-hit spots."

EDIT 5: november 6th. total fatalities climb to at least 83. 140+ injured. 14+ missing people. in jamaica, the cost of damage is 6 billion USD. they're still calculating the damage across the rest of the impacted areas.

communities in jamaica are still waiting for aid.

in haiti, cases of cholera are rising.

don't turn a blind eye. as media coverage slows, and it will, so will aid.