Melissa Aftermath: If We Make It To 2026, Watch Out World

When Hurricane Melissa made landfall in Jamaica as a Category 5 storm, ITDRC activated faster than ever before in our organization’s history. Within 48 hours, field teams were on the ground. Within a week, we had established 14 connectivity hubs across the island’s western parishes.

This is a story about what happened — and what it tells us about where ITDRC is headed.

The Scale of the Response

The numbers tell part of the story: over 200 volunteers mobilized, 14 connectivity hubs established, more than 40,000 survivors with access to communications who would otherwise have had none.

But the numbers don’t tell the full story.