Officials in Jamaica are warning of an unfolding catastrophe as Hurricane Melissa bears down on the island nation with sustained winds of up to 175 miles per hour. The Category 5 storm is the strongest on Earth this year and the most powerful hurricane on record ever to strike Jamaica, likely to trigger widespread flooding and landslides, with catastrophic damage to buildings in the path of the hurricane’s eye. Some parts of Jamaica could see up to 40 inches of rain — more rain than typically falls in an entire year. Melissa has already killed three people each in Jamaica and Haiti and one person in the Dominican Republic. Hurricane warnings are also in effect for parts of Cuba and the Bahamas.

Meanwhile, many Haitians fear the storm could worsen the humanitarian crisis in Haiti, where residents already face widespread poverty and gang violence. This is Fortune Vital, a resident of a camp for displaced people in Haiti’s western Les Cayes region.

Fortune Vital: “We have nothing in our hands to live on. If a hurricane hits, we’re screwed. If the hurricane comes on top of all the problems we already have, we’ll simply die. My kids, my wife and my family are somewhere else. We have nothing to eat to survive. This adds to the problem of bandits shooting all day. There’s no way out except to die.”

Melissa exploded in strength from a tropical storm on Saturday to a Category 4 hurricane on Sunday, a rapid intensification made possible by abnormally warm waters in the Caribbean. Climate scientists say human activity is causing oceans to warm dramatically, making rapidly developing storms more common.