The storm was making its way to the Bahamas and Bermuda on Thursday morning as Jamaica confronted the devastation from one of the most potent storms ever recorded anywhere.

Melissa, now a Category 2 hurricane, will bring heavy rain from the Mid-Atlantic to New England as it heads toward Bermuda and Newfoundland, Canada.

Communities across the Caribbean are reeling in the wake of Hurricane Melissa, which ripped through Jamaica, Cuba and Hispaniola, the island comprising Haiti and the Dominican Republic, this week. While officials said that damage assessments remained underway to determine the full scope of the destruction,

Category 5 Hurricane Melissa sped up early Tuesday making landfall in Jamaica around 1 p.m, tying the record for the strongest landfall in the Atlantic.

Multiple hurricane relief crews assemble supplies to deliver to Jamaica as well as evacuate stranded Americans to come home.

CBS News Miami has been in touch with families living through the aftermath, including Marvin Edwards, who rode out the hurricane in Montego Bay.

AI-generated videos claiming to show Hurricane Melissa have been circulating on social media, causing confusion.

Hurricane Melissa is on track to pass through the southeastern islands of the Bahamas, which are sparsely populated compared to the islands in the north of the archipelago. The two islands that are in the storm’s direct path, Crooked Island and Long Island, have a total population of just a few thousand people.