Jamaica and other parts of the Caribbean are staring down what could become a catastrophic, days-long assault of extreme rainfall and damaging winds with a strengthening Tropical Storm Melissa expected to become a major hurricane over some of the hottest ocean water on the planet.

Melissa is expected to rapidly intensify over the weekend to category 4 and could bring devastating rains to Jamaica early next week.

Parts of the Dominican Republic, Haiti and Jamaica could pick up over 12 inches of additional rainfall through next week.