Secretary of State Marco Rubio pledges "immediate humanitarian aid" to Cuba as State Department responds to effects of Hurricane Melissa in the Caribbean.

Hurricane Melissa brought hurricane-force gusts to Bermuda overnight and will weaken as it heads north, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. Maps show its forecast path.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the State Department had issued a formal Declaration of Humanitarian Assistance for Cuba, where U.S. government aid is rare.

The United States is prepared to offer immediate humanitarian aid to people of Cuba who were affected by Hurricane Melissa, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Thursday. The department has issued a declaration for humanitarian assistance for Cuba,

Jamaica is expected to be in the storm's eyewall, which refers to the band of dense clouds surrounding the eye of the hurricane. The eyewall generally produces the fiercest winds and heaviest rainfall, according to Deanna Hence, a professor of climate, meteorology and atmospheric sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

In the last 25 years, a total of 10 major hurricanes have lashed the island. “Cuba is right in the center of things,” a weather historian said.

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Cuba worked on Friday to rescue residents still stranded by unprecedented floodwaters in the wake of Hurricane Melissa, including a flooded river that had cut off one of the country's most important east-west thoroughfares.