Hurricane Melissa’s torrential floods have cut off entire communities across parts of the Caribbean, but help is already arriving from the skies. Drones are flying over washed-out bridges and submerged roads to deliver food, water and other essentials to people stranded by one of the most powerful storms on record.

As Hurricane Melissa bore down on the region, Dominican Republic President Luis Abinader oversaw his country’s National Emergency and Security Response System. Wearing a black baseball cap with “911” in red lettering, he walked through a large warehouse on Friday, Oct. 24, where workers were busy assembling relief packages for communities cut off by rising floodwaters.

Rice, salt, sardines and other food, along with blankets, mosquito nets and additional supplies, were stuffed into clear plastic bags. After the hurricane’s massive bands sideswiped the Dominican Republic over the next 36 hours, dumping as much as three feet of rain in some areas, workers loaded the packaged supplies onto large nets and attached them to drones.

The multi-rotor drones flew over tree canopies, rivers and severely flooded areas to deliver the relief packages. By the evening of Oct. 27, more than 50 communities in the Dominican Republic had been cut off, at least 75 homes were damaged, and one death was reported.

Once viewed as tools for hobbyists and photographers, drones have become indispensable in disaster response. Some can carry heavy payloads, deliver medical supplies and flotation devices, or relay communication signals to reconnect isolated residents. Others are equipped with AI-powered vision systems capable of locating people beneath debris — transforming the technology from novelty to necessity.

That transformation took hold during Hurricane Harvey in 2017, when emergency crews in Texas used drones to assess flood damage and locate survivors. Since then, they have become fixtures in responses to hurricanes, wildfires and other large-scale emergencies.

Massive destruction and flooding are expected in Jamaica, which lies directly in Hurricane Melissa’s projected path. The country has been building a robust drone program with the assistance of Canadian disaster relief officials.

According to the Jamaican Information Service (JIS), a governmental news agency, Jamaica received new drones on Aug. 26, 2025, under the Natural Resources Canada – Technical Assistance Partnership (TAP) Project. The program, designed to bolster the nation’s disaster preparedness, provides technology and training in geospatial mapping and data analysis to support emergency response.

“This is being done through TAP, which is being executed by the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation in partnership with Natural Resources Canada’s Centre for Mapping and Earth Observation that’s providing technical assistance to stakeholders in this Ministry,” said Shehryar Sarwar, head of development cooperation for Jamaica and Belize at the High Commission of Canada, as reported by JIS.

Sarwar said the initiative includes instruction in AI-based mapping systems that can process real-time data after a storm. “We hope that Jamaica will improve its capacity to prepare and respond to disaster, as well as improve the resilience of vulnerable and marginalized communities,” he said.

For local officials, the timing could not be more critical. Alicia Edwards, principal director of the Ministry’s National Spatial Data Management Branch, said the new drones will provide fast, accurate information to support recovery decisions.

“We look forward to the drones, especially since your technical team pushes authoritative, quality data that we can use to train the whole system to determine damage,” Edwards told JIS.

According to JIS, Jamaican emergency teams are also using Geo-AI, a technology that analyzes aerial images to identify and categorize damage, helping to prioritize where resources are needed most. That work is supported by the National Emergency Geographic Information System (NERGIS) team, which assists the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) with post-storm assessments.

“With use of the drones, now, we could have an automated response to disasters; instead of having a person physically go or putting themselves at risk, we could have the drone do a flyover,” said Okieno Samuels, the Ministry’s GIS project manager.

He added that integrating the new technology will improve post-disaster evaluation and strengthen Jamaica’s long-term resilience strategy.