The owner of Bermuda public relations firm Troncossi, Liz Tee, was in Barcelona only days before yesterday’s terrorist attack that left 13 dead and at least 50 injured.

She left her hotel just off Las Ramblas on Monday to travel several hours to the coastal resort of San Sebastian in Spain’s Basque country.

She said: “August is one of the busiest months for tourism in Barcelona — Las Ramblas is a very, very busy street and there were probably thousands of people on it when I was there.

“It was very busy — wall to wall with people walking and enjoying the city.

“It’s an awful place to have a terrorist attack.”

She said that the Spanish people she had since spoken to were “absolutely devastated”.

“They were very sombre when I spoke to them.

“I asked them if they were aware if anyone had taken responsibility and they said not yet.

“They just shook their heads and said they were very sad about the situation.”

Ms Tee said she was reluctant to speculate on who was responsible for the carnage in Barcelona, which is similar to attacks carried out in London and elsewhere in Europe by terrorists inspired by Islamic fundamentalism.

But she added: “Certainly, it has all the hallmarks of a terrorism attack.

“I’m not nervous — I’m far away from Barcelona, but it was a terrible thing to happen to people.”