Gathering data from planes inside hurricanes is a dangerous game and 52 lives have been lost since operations began in 1944.

Hurricane Melissa intensified to a Category 5 storm on Monday amid warnings of 'life-threatening' flooding' in Jamaica.

Samaritan’s Purse, the international aid agency headed by veteran evangelist Rev. Franklin Graham, has mobilized its Disaster Assistance Response Team to help Jamaicans suffering after Hurricane Melissa devastated the Caribbean island —the most powerful in the nation’s history since records began in 1851.

A hurricane forms when warm, moist air rises from the ocean surface and creates a spinning system of clouds and storms. In the centre, air sinks, creating the eye, a calm, cloud-free zone surrounded by a wall of violent winds and rain known as the eye-wall.

Hurricane Melissa is packing sustained winds of up to 175 m/h (282 km/h) as the slow-moving Category 5 storm barrels towards Jamaica, in what could be the largest on record for the Caribbean island.

Ferocious winds and torrential rain tore into Jamaica Tuesday as Hurricane Melissa made landfall, the worst storm ever to strike the island nation and one of the most powerful hurricanes on record.