A demolished church, roofs blown off homes, shattered windows and debris-strewn, impassable roads: Hurricane Melissa dealt a direct hit to Jamaica’s southwestern coastal communities that face a long haul picking up the pieces.

“It has been devastating,” officer Warrell Nicholson told AFP by phone from the Black River police station, a building that was damaged but has still become something of a refuge for people seeking shelter.

Footage of the area shows felled trees, smashed cars, downed power lines and ruined homes — a portrait of wreckage that is only starting to come clear as assessment is hampered by a lack of power and communications across the Caribbean island.

Hurricane Melissa smashed into Jamaica as a ferocious top-level storm, whose sustained winds peaked at 185 miles (295 k

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