Hurricane Rafael made landfall in the Cuban province of Artemisa on Wednesday evening as a Category 3 hurricane after it caused power outages and flooding in its trek past Jamaica and the Cayman Islands earlier in the day.

By Frances Robles Isabella Kwai and Claire Moses Hurricane Rafael arrived in Cuba on Wednesday afternoon, plunging the island into a power failure just before making landfall as a powerful Category 3 storm in the western Cuban province of Artemisa on Wednesday.

After briefly becoming a major hurricane and making landfall in western Cuba Wednesday evening, Rafael is now expected to avoid landfall in the United States, AccuWeather meteorologists say. Rafael is beginning a more westward track that will take it away from the U.

Hurricane Rafael pushed into the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday night after plowing across western Cuba as a Category 3 hurricane with winds so powerful it knocked out the entire country's power grid.