Hurricane Melissa's devastating passage leaves nearly 50 dead in Haiti and Jamaica

Melissa, the worst Atlantic hurricane in nearly a century, left at least 30 dead in Haiti and 19 in Jamaica, as well as parts of Cuba in ruins, as it moved across the Caribbean Thursday toward Bermuda.

Flooding is expected to subside in the Bahamas, which lifted its hurricane warning, although it could persist in Cuba, Jamaica, Haiti and the Dominican Republic, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.

"Conditions in Bermuda are going to deteriorate rapidly tonight," the NHC said, referring to the arrival of Melissa to that archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean with maximum sustained winds near 165 kilometers per hour (km/h).

In Haiti, which was not directly impacted by the hurricane but is suffering heavy rains, at least 30 people, including 10 children, died and 20 are missing, according to a new official balance sheet released Thursday.

Most of the deaths (23) were caused by a flash flood in the southwest of the country.

In Jamaica, "the confirmed death toll from Hurricane Melissa is now 19," Information Minister Dana Morris Dixon told reporters.

Meanwhile, the scourge of Melissa on Wednesday aggravated an already difficult situation in Cuba due to the severe economic crisis that has affected the island for the past five years.

In Santiago de Cuba, the country's second-largest city, the storm caused sections of houses to collapse and roofs to blow off. The city was without electricity and many power lines lay on the ground.

"This cyclone has killed us because it has left us destroyed," Felicia Correa, who lives in the hamlet of La Trampa, some 20 kilometers east of Santiago de Cuba, told AFP.

"We were already going through tremendous hardship. Now of course we are much worse," the 65-year-old added.

In El Cobre, near La Trampa, the sound of hammers could be heard: those who lost the roof of their homes were trying to repair it with the help of friends or neighbors, AFP observed. Others ventured out in search of food, while some stores began to reopen.

Cuban authorities reported that some 735,000 people were evacuated, especially in the provinces of Santiago de Cuba, Holguin and Guantanamo.

Melissa was already wreaking havoc in the region, where many perished while protecting their homes before its arrival. The power of the storm surpassed that of hurricanes such as Katrina, which devastated the city of New Orleans in 2005.