Last Updated: Tuesday, 6 September 2005, 11:35 GMT 12:35 UK
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Britons describe hurricane ordeal
The rubbish-strewn Superdome
Britons returning from New Orleans have described the horrifying conditions there.
They were among the thousands forced to seek refuge from the floods that engulfed the city following Hurricane Katrina.
Some 96 Britons still remain unaccounted for.
MICHELLE ANDREWS
Student Michelle Andrews, 20, said she had been sheltering on the 17th floor of a New Orleans hotel when Katrina hit.
They just turned us away and said we would have to fend for ourselves
Michelle Andrews
"We just lay down in the corridors as these thick white clouds just closed in on us. It was Hell."
But after the hurricane passed, the hotel asked Ms Andrews, from south Wales, and the friends she was travelling with to leave.
"We went to a convention centre where the National Guard was based - but they just turned us away and said we would have to fend for ourselves."
The group ended up sleeping rough on a 30ft-high covered walkway before being found by an Australian television crew and rescued.
"Every day we woke to more dead bodies and people with guns. There was polluted water everywhere and the smell was awful. And there was no electricity. It was so dark."
TERESA CHERRIE AND JOHN DRYSDALE
Nurse Teresa Cherrie, 42, and her partner lorry driver John Drysdale, 41, said they had flown to the US on 27 August, after their travel company told them the "tropical storm" would only last a day.
We got told to go ahead and enjoy our holiday
John Drysdale
"We never had any idea of what we were getting into. We got told to go ahead and enjoy our holiday," Mr Drysdale said.
The couple, from Renfrew in Scotland, fled from New Orleans to Baton Rouge, where they were forced to scavenge for food, while hiding from armed gangs.
"We were getting followed about... they were saying, 'They've got water, they've got water'," Mr Drysdale said.
Ms Cherrie said they would send a cheque to reimburse a store they had looted.
"We only took some water and we took some food and some tins and a carton of cigarettes."
JENNY SACHS
Jenny Sachs, of Sheffield, told how soldiers had to smuggle her out of the Superdome in secret.
She was one of about 30 Britons who, realising they could not escape the city, had fled to the stadium for shelter.
The military got us out, which we were all thankful for
Jenny Sachs
Watch Jenny Sachs
"It has hit me more now I am at home, when you can have clean water, how bad it was," she said.
She said people had been raped and that others were beaten up.
"A guy was brought in who had seven stab wounds and was covered in blood."
The military told all non-US citizens to stay together for safety, Ms Sachs added.
They later told them they would be secretly smuggled out in groups of 10 under cover of darkness as it had become too dangerous for them to remain in the stadium, she told BBC News.
"When we were leaving, people were going 'Where are you going?' and giving us looks.
"But the military got us out, which we were all thankful for."
GED, SANDRA AND RONAN SCOTT
After looters had broken into New Orleans' Ramada Hotel, bus driver Ged Scott, 36, of Liverpool - stranded with his wife Sandra, 37, and their seven-year-old son, Ronan - had waded waist-deep through the filthy water to barricade the hotel's doors, he told BBC News.
I could see bodies floating in the water
Ged Scott
Watch the interview
"It was like wading through an open sewer.
"It reeked to high heaven and made you want to vomit.
"Outside I could see bodies floating in the water."
Mr Scott told BBC News he had ripped wires attached to speakers from the walls of the flooded hotel bar and tied tables and chairs together as makeshift barricades.
Hotel guests had already managed to chase one group of looters from the building, he added.
They had then taken turns patrolling the hotel's corridors with a torch, Mr Scott told BBC News.
The rest of the eye witness accounts from this BBC report are here.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4214746.stm