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A Fox Weather crew reporting on Hurricane Melissa from Jamaica had to duck for cover and avoid shattered glass as the storm battered their filming location. The reporters were forced to scramble from the top floor down to the ground floor as the windows cracked and gave way under sustained pressure from the Category 5 hurricane-force winds. They had been covering the worsening weather from a rental home in Saint Ann's Parish when the hurricane tore through the region on Tuesday afternoon. 'That used to be a balcony,' FOX Weather correspondent Robert Ray noted as he pointed to a now collapsed pile of rubble on the ground floor. 'The entire porch and all the sliding doors blown out.' He added that the room was 'literally unraveling' as he spoke to the camera. 'I want you to just listen to the hiss and the roar that comes through here. It is beyond scary, beyond frightening,' he said. 'And I just hope that aid can come in.' At the time of filming, Ray said the wild weather had already dragged on for hours and there was no end in sight. A member of the security team had earlier ushered them down to the ground floor, shouting 'move fast, let's go.' 'Don't go that way, there's glass. Go, go... glass, glass,' another said. Shards of glass from shattered glass sliding doors which had been torn from their hinges were strewn across the floor in the carnage. Later in the evening, a second video captured under darkness showed winds still billowing through the home, which was still standing after the worst of the hurricane tore through but was overcome by debris. Ray praised his two-member security team, who are Jamaican locals and offered support to the crew while also fearing for the safety of their families and homes. He revealed that once it was safe to leave the home, the crew intended to travel 50 miles to Montego Bay, the town where one of his security guards lives. 'I just want you to understand the explosion of glass and furniture and walls in here,' he said. 'We have to manouver through the water.' Hurricane Melissa made landfall in Jamaica as a Category 5 storm about 1pm on Tuesday, with winds reaching 185 mph. Dozens have been left dead across Haiti, Jamaica and Cuba, while more than 70 percent of Jamaicans are without power as of Wednesday. The Fox crew was using a Starlink device to share footage and pictures of the carnage. A landslide blocked the main roads of Santa Cruz in Jamaica's St. Elizabeth parish, where the streets were reduced to mud pits. Residents swept water from homes as they tried to salvage belongings. Wind ripped off part of the roof at a high school that serves as a public shelter. 'Recovery will take time, but the government is fully mobilized,' Prime Minister Andrew Holness said in a statement. 'Relief supplies are being prepared, and we are doing everything possible to restore normalcy quickly.' At least 23 people have died across Haiti and 13 are missing, Haiti's Civil Protection Agency said in a statement, revising the death toll downward. Twenty of those reported dead and 10 of the missing are from the southern coastal town of Petit-Goâve, where flooding collapsed dozens of homes. In Cuba, officials reported collapsed houses, blocked mountain roads and roofs blown off buildings Wednesday, with the heaviest destruction concentrated in the southwest and northwest. Authorities said about 735,000 people remained in shelters. The United States is sending rescue and response teams to assist in recovery efforts in the Caribbean, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced on X. He said government officials were coordinating with leadership in Jamaica, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas. By Wednesday afternoon, Melissa had top sustained winds of 100 mph (155 kph) and was moving toward the Bahamas. Michael Brennan, director of the National Hurricane Center, said the storm began affecting the southeastern Bahamas on Wednesday. Authorities in the Bahamas were evacuating dozens of people from the archipelago's southeast corner ahead of Melissa's arrival. 'The storm is growing in size,' Brennan said, noting that tropical storm force winds now extend almost 200 miles (320 kilometers) from the center. Melissa's center is forecast to move through southeastern Bahamas later Wednesday, generating up to 7 feet (2 meters) of storm surge in the area. By late Thursday, Melissa is expected to pass just west of Bermuda.
