Irish survivors of hurricane return home

THREE Irish students stranded in the devastation that hit New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina yesterday paid tribute to those who helped them flee the city.

Tomas McLaughlin, Patrick Clarke and Conor Lally, all from Co Louth, spent three nights in the Superdome, a makeshift refugee camp for some of those worst affected by the storm.

The boyhood friends said conditions in the overcrowded sports arena were horrific and scary, with little food, no water and street gangs roaming the stands.

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, they 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 shouting abuse at us just basically because we were getting out. They just felt trapped,” Conor said.

Tomas, a 20-year-old student at NUI, Galway explained the week’s events.

“We decided to go to the Superdome on Sunday evening and the hurricane occurred that night, early Monday morning, and we were there until Wednesday morning,” he said.

“It was just a scary, scary place. We were just so grateful to get out. It was just dangerous. The corridors were packed, it was very over-populated, no electricity, no running water, no flushing water which was a big one, no hygiene. We were on army rations. There wasn’t enough water to go around. A lot of people there were poor. The standard of living was very low, therefore the conditions were just horrific.”

The students, who travelled to the US for a working holiday on J1 visas and spent a number of weeks at Myrtle Beach in North Carolina, had harsh words for the US government’s relief operation.

Conor, a 20-year-old student at Queen’s University, Belfast, said people’s thoughts should be with the poor and homeless in the southern states.

“We are the lucky ones, it’s the people in New Orleans that are still left there,” Conor said.

The students were taken to a nearby temporary medical centre before travelling for 10 hours to Dallas, Texas, where Irish consular staff were on hand to assist their return.

As the three students emerged from the arrivals terminal at Dublin airport they were greeted with cheers, applause and tears from family and friends.

Last night, the Department of Foreign Affairs said it still trying to make contact with about 10 Irish people who were in the hurricane zone, but a spokeswoman downplayed concerns about a man who was in Biloxi, Mississippi, at the time the storm hit.

“We have no reason to believe he has been killed.

“We have been trying to contact him but we have no reason to believe he is in particular danger. He is in an area where communication has not come back up yet,” she said.

Irish honeymoon couple Michael Leyden and Jean Whitefield returned home from New Orleans at the weekend. Another five people are receiving support from the Chicago

-based Irish vice-consul, Úna Ní Dhubhghaill.

Information is available through the main switch 01-4082000 or 01-4082585 (Mon-Fri, office hours).