Teen heartbroken for Vanuatu host family

The house at the school where Courtney Tilby volunteered, flattened like many other buildings after the cyclone.

A Tauranga teen who experienced the ferocity of Cyclone Pam in Vanuatu credits her Vanuatuan "family" with saving her life and says the "devastation is heartbreaking".

Courtney Tilby, 19, is safely back in Tauranga this week after enduring the brunt of the cyclone nearly three weeks ago on Pentecost Island, where she was volunteering as a teacher.

During the cyclone, Miss Tilby fled from house to house as roofs were torn off, and ran from falling debris, emerging to find their crops and fresh water source destroyed and many of the buildings flattened.

Courtney Tilby, back, calls Vanuatu her home and the people her family. She spent a week helping out in the urban community of Ohlen Esqal, just outside of Port Vila, before returning home.

"I don't think any of us have actually had time to comprehend the extent of what we have been through," she told the Bay of Plenty Times.

"On the day of the cyclone, I was evacuated three times, from three different houses. As the wind increased, the roofs started to blow off. We had to run down a steep incline to another village 20 minutes away. This was through a coconut plantation. I have my life because of my [Vanuatu] family. My [host] dad in Vanuatu directed me the safest path to follow and would yell when to stop if debris was falling down.

"We lost our church, several kitchens, class six was flattened, the remaining school rooms were broken and most significantly, we lost our crops and fresh water source.

"The devastation is heartbreaking ... Cyclone Pam ripped through the island nation of Vanuatu, destroying homes, power and water supplies, food crops and everything in-between. For the thousands of people already living in extreme poverty, this natural disaster has left them with absolutely nothing - no food, no water, no shelter and no way to rebuild their lives."

Meeting the immediate needs of the communities in crisis was essential, but so too was providing long-term support, she said.

The determined teen and her mum Kerry Tilby-Price were now fundraising for the most in-need areas of Vanuatu and collecting items for a container which would be sent over to the islands.

"I want it to be about supporting Vanuatu, my home and my family. I feel in love with their world. They deserve our love too."

They would focus their support on three communities. The first was the urban community of Ohlen Esqal, just outside of Port Vila.

Miss Tilbly and Mrs Tilby-Price had been volunteering there for the past week, purchasing and distributing food, water, tools and building materials to this community, as well as establishing a mini-clinic to dress wounds caused by broken branches and flying iron.

The second area was the island of Mataso, where two of the 100 residents died.

"Not a single structure, tree or crop survived, and at the time I was leaving Port Vila, they were still waiting for aid," Miss Tilby said.

The third was Miss Tilby's home on the island of Pentecost which had been declared as being in food crisis.

"The terrain makes it very difficult to get aid in, and because of this I am currently unable to return to my Ni-Van family."