US: One of Ireland's honorary consuls recently took on the additional role of detective in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
John Kane, a first cousin of former taoiseach Charles Haughey, drove 2,600km (1,600 miles) around the Gulf Coast region over a period of five days, tracking down Irish citizens who were reported missing.
A businessman who deals in oil, timber and real estate, Mr Kane is also Ireland's honorary consul in Houston, Texas. He has "very strong" Louisiana connections, which proved useful in his search.
"We had calls from family back home who were very concerned. We had our list but they were all over the Gulf Coast, so we were in Mississippi, Alabama, all the way over to the Florida line, back and forth several times," Mr Kane said.
Initially up to 100 Irish citizens were reported as either missing or out of contact, but by the time Mr Kane took to the road there were only five who still had to be located.
Accompanied by an official from the Irish Consulate in New York, David Healy, he drove all over the region, checking leads, addresses and contacts.
Phone lines were down all over the place so there was heavy reliance on personal contact and knocking on doors. "I refer to David as Sherlock and I was Watson, because that's pretty well what it was. We'd get a lead and then we'd run back 200 miles to another town."
The oldest of the five was a woman in her early 90s who was living in a nursing home on the beachfront at Biloxi, Mississippi, right in the path of the hurricane. She was initially moved to a school in nearby Gulfport and then to a hospital in Mobile, Alabama.
"It was a lot of detective work. After we exhausted the American Red Cross and the State Department it was down to the 'Irish way'. We contacted all the priests and nuns in the area and they were able to give us more leads and phone numbers and then we tracked down pub-owners in the Carolinas that had also been evacuated to get their cell numbers to call."
The effort paid off: "We found 'em all."
Mr Kane's mother, Mary Jane McWilliams (94), lives in Bronxville, New York, but was originally from Swatragh, Co Derry. She is Mr Haughey's aunt.