WHILE it is Richard Bran-son’s family and guests that have had the most coverage following a fire at his tropical island home, there are another group of residents who also had a lucky escape – a group of ring-tailed lemurs.

Many people are unaware that the tycoon recently started a project to create a colony of lemurs on the island, which Cotswold Wildlife Park was closely involved in.

And the park has now received the good news that all the lemurs are safe and weren’t affected by the tropical storms.

Hayley Rothwell, the deputy section head of primates, recently flew to Necker Island after staff asked her to help with Branson’s lemur conservation project.

The millionaire, who has long been involved in efforts to save threatened animals around the world, said he wanted to bring the first group of lemurs from zoos to Moskito Island, part of the British Virgin Islands, where they would be the only wild population outside of Africa.

Hayley travelled with nine ring-tail lemurs, which came from collections in South Africa and Sweden and trained staff on how to care and look after the lemurs All the animals settled in very well and staff said it had been a great help having Hayley there.

She remains involved after being asked to act as a consultant in the future.