Local fundraising efforts to help after devastation of Irma

• Click to watch a report by ITV News Anglia's Hannah Pettifer

The island of Barbuda has been described as being reduced to rubble after Hurricane Irma swept through last week.

For Alice Bolton, the scenes of devastation were particularly painful to see as she has two cousins living there, who she grew up with around Elmswell near Bury St Edmunds.

She is now fundraising to help those affected on the island and hoping to go out there herself as part of the relief effort.

Alice is now asking for donations from the local community - tools, nails, wood, generators - to send over to Barbuda to help the island start rebuilding.

She hopes the donations will eventually fill up two shipping containers.

Hurricane Irma tore through the island last week, destroying 90% of its buildings and leaving around half of Barbuda's population of 1,600 homeless.

The national repair and reconstruction bill has been estimated to be around $150 million.

Alice's family has also set up a fundraising page online which has reached almost £20,000.

These are the items that the family would like donated:

• hand tools

• buckets/wheelbarrows

• tarpaulins

• heavy duty plastic sheeting

• screws, nails, bolts, hinges

• generators

• drills and screwdrivers

• galvanised sheeting

According to the British government, more than 60 tonnes of UK aid has now reached the Caribbean to support the victims of Hurricane Irma, with another 60 tonnes on the way on board HMS Ocean.

British military troops along with Department for International Development logisticians supported the restoration of electricity to the main power station on the British Virgin Islands as part of the ongoing recovery operation.

Six UK medical health experts have been deployed to Antigua to assess the capacity of healthcare provisions on affected islands in the region.