British students survive the Superdome

Around 30 British students ganged up to survive the squalor and the violence that has taken over the New Orleans Superdome in recent days, taking turns to sleep and guard themselves against armed and desperate flood survivors.

Jamie Trout, 22, an economics student from Sunderland, kept a diary of his four uncertain days in the stadium, extracts of which were published in The Daily Mirror: "It was like something out of Lord of the Flies - one minute everything is calm and civil, the next it descends into chaos," he said.

In one entry, he wrote: "A man has been arrested for raping a seven-year-old in the toilet, this place is hell. I feel sick. The smell is horrendous, there are toilets overflowing and people everywhere."

The Astrodome is full

The Houston Astrodome, the American football stadium which yesterday started receiving the first refugees from the New Orleans Superdome, is full, according to officials running the relief effort there.

After accepting 11,375 flood survivors, less than half of the 23,000 of the refugees on their way to the stadium, the Astrodome will now turn away buses to other shelters in Houston, the American Red Cross said. "We’ve actually reached capacity for the safety and comfort of the people inside there," said a spokeswoman.

The evacuation of the Superdome will continue today. Last night it was thought that the angry crowd waiting for buses out of New Orleans had grown to 30,000.

Fundraising starts: Sri Lanka chips in

Former presidents George Bush Snr and Bill Clinton will lead an appeal for public donations to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina, it was announced last night. The two men led a similar campaign in the aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami.

Donations and offers of help from around the world continued today, with Australia sending A$10 million (£4.2 million) to the American Red Cross and a team of 20 disaster recovery experts to the Gulf Coast. Japan and Singapore have also offered donations and supplies for the recovery effort, including three Chinook helicopters.

Dozens of countries, including some of the world's poorest, have volunteered to help, including El Salvador, Honduras and the Dominican Republic. Sri Lanka, which received substantial US aid and military support after the tsunami, offered $25,000.

Confusion over EU oil aid

There was confusion today over whether members of the EU would give America oil if it requests help to meet energy demands after the damage wrought by Hurricane Katrina.

Javier Solana, the head of EU foreign policy, said this morning that countries would enter into bilateral agreements to supply oil donations to the US, contradicting comments made by Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, yesterday, who said they would not.

"We are in contact with them and whatever they ask for they will be given, from reserves of oil that different countries have provided, to any other thing that they may need," Mr Solana told reporters at a meeting of EU foreign minister meeting today.

Should New Orleans be rebuilt?

The Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert questioned the wisdom of rebuilding a city that will always be 7ft below sea level yesterday, and then quickly sought to modify his comments.

Speaking to the Daily Herald, a suburban Chicago paper, Mr Hastert, a congressman from Ilinois said: "First of all, your heart goes out to the people, the loss of their homes. But there are some real tough questions to ask about how you go about rebuilding the city."

Asked whether billions should be spent on reconstructing New Orleans, Mr Hastert went on: "I don’t know. That doesn’t make sense to me."

Later Mr Hastert said he had been trying express his concern that the city should be rebuilt in a way that leaves it so vulnerable to flooding. "My comments about rebuilding the city were intended to reflect my sincere concern with how the city is rebuilt to ensure the future protection of its citizens," he said.

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