ILS World chief executive officer Chris Eaton has returned from an eye-opening trip to the company’s office and staff in a Caribbean island devastated by Hurricane Irma.

Based at Millennium House, Victoria Road, Douglas, ILS World has had an office in the British Virgin Islands for more than 20 years.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Irma a state of emergency was declared and with sporadic power communication was difficult.

At the first practical opportunity prominent business figure Mr Eaton went to see for himself.

He told Business News: The arrivals lounge in Tortola [the largest of the British Virgin Islands] welcomed me as it has always done and as I stepped outside into the sunshine it felt good to be back in the Caribbean.

’It took time to adjust, I thought I had stepped into a war zone - I suppose anything truly shocking doesn’t sink in immediately.

Images on the news only show a snapshot but when you are on the ground and looking at a 360 degree picture the immense scale of the destruction following Hurricane Irma become apparent. I have been in the BVI after tropical storms many times but this was unlike anything I have ever seen before or will see again.’

I was visiting five weeks after the hurricane and there was debris everywhere - cars had been upturned, yachts and catamarans had been lifted from their moorings and were lying upside down by the side of road. Concrete and tarmac had been ripped up and washed away, the trees didn’t have any tops and all the vegetation was stripped from plants, leaving only brown twigs. It looked like a bomb had gone off but the impact was not in one localised area - it was everywhere. The scale of the damage was overwhelming.

My trip had started smoothly but when I arrived in Antigua the scale of the disruption in the region became apparent. The family owned business operating the small shuttle plane taking me to Tortola had an aircraft hangar destroyed on the Island and they had unsuccessfully tried to find a hanger in Saint John and Puerto Rico before getting something suitable in Antigua. Travel is still not straightforward.

I had been able to book a hotel room but it wasn’t until I checked into the reception which had a dozen buckets dotted around to collect the leaks I found out I was occupying the one habitable room.

Surprisingly the supermarkets were quite well stocked but there are still a lot of people without homes and power. I did not see a single upright telegraph pole during my visit but I did see the staff of the power company working incredibly hard to get things operational. There was a strong sense of community and everyone I met was trying to get back to normal. It is surprising more people weren’t injured and tales are rife of some close calls - I heard of one house where the windows had smashed and the change in air pressure had sucked the bed through window, the man had to save his wife by grabbing her ankles.

Our staff are coping brilliantly in very challenging conditions - one is living with a neighbour, another with her sister and another has moved in with her parents. One man only has a couple of rooms that are useable and one woman who normally lives on her own has 12 people staying with her. Another member of staff is sleeping in her vehicle at night, especially when it rains as her house takes in a lot of water and another has a house where all windows were blown out.

Despite these personal challenges they have been determined to get our office in Tortola up and running. They have shown a great deal of resilience, purpose and resolve and have cleared away debris, restored water, power and internet connections. They have had repairs done to the roof and they are currently waiting for the glass in the windows and doors to be replaced. They have got us up and running and together with assistance from our other offices are offering a full service to clients.

The government is pushing the message the Island is getting back to normal but people should have realistic expectations. Irma spent three days as a category five hurricane; no other hurricane has ever sustained that much power for that long. It had winds of more than 185 miles per hour for 37 hours, which is also a record amount of time.

ILS opened its office in Tortola 23 years ago and I have watched it grow and prosper. Everyone in the group feels a responsibility to continue supporting the humanitarian fundraising efforts and to keep reminding people of what has happened in the Caribbean. It is going to take a lot of time and money to get it back to how it was.

Cars wrecked by the hurricane still litter the streets in scenes of devastation. Chris Eaton took this picture only days ago

Chris Eaton