viral news world : Paradise at the mercy of rapists and murderers: A chilling dispatch from the hurricane-hit Caribbean island where British commandos are hunting escaped convicts

On the road into town on Tortola, a British territory since the 17th century, visitors are usually greeted by smiling locals and azure seas.

The tourist guides talk of ‘powdery white-sand beaches, lush green mountains, sheltered, yacht-filled harbours’ and quaint spots like Apple Bay and Smuggler’s Cove.

No more: paradise is lost on the British Virgin Islands (BVI) after Hurricane Irma battered the area with winds gusting at around 200 miles an hour, blowing roofs off houses and leaving at least five people dead and dozens more injured.

As the first British newspaper journalist to reach the BVI, which have been cut off since the storm hit ten days ago, I witnessed the scenes of devastation that have left Tortola, the largest island of this once verdant tropical archipelago of 59 smaller islands, reduced to barren wasteland after the hurricane blew almost every leaf off almost every tree.

Local estimates suggest that around 90 per cent of homes, businesses and boats were damaged or destroyed.

‘It’s like a scene from Passchendaele or the Somme,’ one British military adviser told me. ‘Look around — the place has been devastated. We are here to provide security and assistance.’

The officer was one of an advance party of 50 Royal Marine Commandos, who were dispatched soon after the disaster amid allegations that the Government was slow to react compared to other countries who immediately began military evacuations.

Tortola has been reduced to barren wasteland after Hurricane Irma blew almost every leaf off almost every tree

Local estimates suggest that around 90 per cent of homes, businesses and boats were damaged or destroyed

The disclosure came after the Mail revealed the Government’s £13 billion foreign aid fund could not be used to help these devastated UK territories — because the islands are supposedly not poor enough to merit help.

That row is likely to intensify after military sources told me the operation was in ‘disarray’ from the beginning, with service personnel forced to beg for weapons and ammunition from local police because their equipment did not arrive with them.

‘We have had to borrow rations, ammunition, weapons and other kit,’ the source told me last night. ‘It’s fair to say that the logistics were not fully behind us, and there was some disarray.’