Survivors: Three Irish students told yesterday how they were rescued by a National Guard sergeant from street gangs wreaking havoc in a makeshift refugee camp in New Orleans.
The three friends from Blackrock, Co Louth who returned home yesterday told how a burly officer named Sgt Ogden took them under his wing and guaranteed their safety.
Thomas McLaughlin, Conor Lally and Patrick Clarke, who were left stranded after Hurricane Katrina hit land, described the officer as "a lifesaver".
The trio were ordered to take shelter in the city's Superdome on Sunday night.
They said police officers warned them about riots and fights between gangs and that a number of rapes had occurred.
Inside the dome, paramedics warned them that a soldier had been overpowered in the toilets and shot in the leg with his own rifle.
Patrick Clarke, a 20-year-old photography student, said city streets strewn with bodies and the mayhem of the dome left New Orleans looking like a war zone.
"As time went on, because the National Guard didn't have enough troops there to take control of the situation, tempers were beginning to fray. The situation is just getting worse," he said.
"New Orleans is a war zone at the moment. Now we only experienced this very briefly, but the American government, I mean really, have to get in there now, quickly."
He said that by working as a group with many other travellers they managed to get the help of Sgt Ogden.
After a tearful reunion with family and friends in Dublin yesterday, the students told how they fled the mayhem in the dome.
The trio said 103 foreigners were taken out of the dome under the orders of National Guardsman Sgt Ogden. The students said he ignored initial commands to keep everyone inside and told troops to bring them to safety.
With little food or water for three nights, the group were taken to a nearby medical centre. Facing a barrage of verbal, and some physical, abuse from those left behind, Sgt Ogden ensured the students were not harmed, they said.
"We had to be escorted by the National Guard out, there was a lot of people coming up to us, saying are you leaving and just shouting abuse at us, just basically because we were getting out. They just felt trapped," Conor Lally said.
A day and a half later the three set off on a 10-hour bus journey to Dallas, Texas to be flown home.
"The people that looked after us are doing such a phenomenal job and I cannot have enough praise for the soldiers, for the medical staff who took care of us and are still there," Patrick said.
Mr Jim Lally of Blackrock, Co Louth said his son Conor (20) was lucky to be alive. "Conor was very tired when he got home at 8.30 this morning. It was an emotional moment for us all.
"He told us a little of conditions in the dome and he said 'Dad, there are some things I can't even talk about'. There were a lot of gangs in the dome and a lot of fighting.
"A seven-year-old was raped and murdered. There were addicts and alcoholics going cold turkey."
Mr John McLoughlin, also of Blackrock, Co Louth, said his son Thomas had explained that "anyone who could afford it had left New Orleans".
He added: "The three boys were due to fly out the night before the hurricane hit but all flights were grounded.
The people who were left who went to the dome were the poor, the addicted, the old and the infirm. The boys volunteered to help and as the medicine ran out they could do little more than fan the elderly."
The families praised the efforts of Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern, who is their local TD, and those of the Irish consul in Chicago, Charles Sheehan.
Many British people who had also been stranded in New Orleans also began arriving home at Gatwick Airport in London yesterday.
Sisters Charlotte Scott (19) and Rebecca (20) of Reading in England had also been in the Superdome.
Charlotte said: "Conditions in there were just horrible for anyone and everyone, most people just wanted to survive." She added: "The smell was horrendous, you just wanted to throw up the whole time."
Summer camp workers Sarah Yorkston (21), Jane Wheeldon (20) and Zoe Smith (21) rushed through the airport to embrace family members as they arrived.
Sarah said: "It was total chaos, and devastation."
Jane, of Carmarthen, south Wales said other people were "still out there right now in horrendous conditions and they just shouldn't be there".