Hurricane Melissa was grinding across Cuba on Wednesday as a Category 2 storm after pummelling Jamaica as one of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes on record, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.

Hundreds of thousands of people had been evacuated to shelters in Cuba. A hurricane warning was in effect for the provinces of Granma, Santiago de Cuba, Guantanamo, Holguin and Las Tunas, as well as southeastern and central Bahamas.

Melissa at 8 a.m. ET was packing sustained winds of 165 kilometres per hour and was moving north-northeast at 22 kilometres per hour, according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami. The hurricane was centred 70 kilometres northwest of Guantánamo, Cuba, and 335 kilometres south of the central Bahamas.

A man uses a plastic sheet to protect himself from the rai

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