HURRICANE Melissa left dozens of people dead and widespread destruction across Cuba, Haiti and Jamaica, where roofless homes, fallen utility poles and waterlogged furniture dominated the landscape today.

Melissa made landfall in Jamaica on Tuesday as a catastrophic Category 5 storm with top winds of 185mph, one of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes on record, before weakening and moving on to Cuba. But even countries outside the direct path of the massive storm felt its devastating effects.

Flooding killed at least 25 people in the southern coastal town of Petit-Goave, Haiti, said mayor Jean Bertrand Subreme, adding that dozens of homes had collapsed when a river burst its banks. People were still trapped under rubble this morning.

Officials in Cuba reported collapsed houses, blocked mountain roads and roofs blown off, with the most destruction concentrated in the south-west and north-west. Authorities said about 735,000 people remained in shelters in the east of the country.

In Jamaica, more than 25,000 people were packed into shelters today after the storm ripped roofs off their homes and left them temporarily homeless.

Education Minister Dana Morris Dixon said 77 per cent of the island was without power and Jamaican officials reported complications in assessing the damage because of power cuts.

At least one death was reported in the west of Jamaica when a tree fell on a baby, state minister Abka Fitz-Henley told the Nationwide News Network.

Melissa had top sustained winds of 100mph by this afternoon and was moving north-east at 14mph, according to the US National Hurricane Centre in Miami. It was centered about 150 miles south of the central Bahamas.

“The storm is growing in size,” said hurricane centre director Michael Brennan, noting that tropical storm force winds now extend almost 200 miles from the middle.

Yesterday the Cuba Solidarity Campaign decided to donate £50,000 immediately to the Cuban relief effort — details (including how to donate) here.