Joan Edghill of Ocoee worried about her 90-year-old uncle in Jamaica as the ferocious Category 5 Hurricane Melissa barreled toward the country where she was born.

“I couldn’t sleep last night just thinking about it,” said Edghill, the President of the Jamaican American Association of Central Florida, on Monday. “But I’m going to trust that God is able to minimize the death toll and the harm that the hurricane can bring.”

Hurricane Melissa, one of the most powerful storms in history with maximum sustained winds of 185 mph and wind gusts up to 220 mph, became the first-ever Category 5 storm to make direct landfall on the island nation at about 1 p.m. Tuesday in southwestern Jamaica near New Hope, the NHC said.

Edghill’s uncle lives in a mountainous region of Clarendon, Jamaica, where floo

See Full Page