FIFTY THOUSAND meals left RAF Brize Norton yesterday bound for Louisiana, the first shipment of Britain’s contribution to the Hurricane Katrina relief effort.

Boil-in-the-bag hotpots and stodgy, high-calorie desserts such as rice pudding are the attractions of the half a million military ration packs which the Ministry of Defence will airlift to the disaster zone over the next few days.

Further emergency supplies such as blankets, tarpaulins, camp beds and military tents could follow later this week, but the US has indicated that food is the most urgent priority. British logistics experts have been sent to work with American staff co-ordinating the distribution of aid from around 50 countries and international organisations.

Brigadier Chris Steirn, of the MoD’s Defence Transport and Movements Agency, who is overseeing the airlift from Brize Norton, said that Britain, as the current holder of the EU presidency, was responding on behalf of Europe to a US request for assistance made through Nato headquarters. Two flights left yesterday bound for a US Air Force base in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Three more will follow today and there will then be further flights every 24 hours after that. The USAF will deal with the distribution of the supplies from the base to the stricken areas, using Little Rock’s fleet of C130 Hercules heavy airlift planes.

The ration packs are standard issue for the British Armed Forces on operations. Each one has 3,500 calories and contains enough food for a soldier on operations for 24 hours. The packs can sustain a civilian in less physically demanding circumstances for twice as long. They include a boil-in-the-bag breakfast and main meal as well as pudding, savoury snacks, biscuits, sweets, coffee and tea and tissues. The pack contains a mini-stove and matches to heat up meals and drinks. Vegetarian versions have also been sent.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said: “All you need is a pot and some water to heat them. You can eat them cold straight from the packet. We are the world leaders in this food. They are streets are ahead of anything the Americans have ever had in their ration packs anyway so they’ll be in for a treat.”

WHAT’S IN A RATION PACK

Breakfast: Boil-in-the-bag sausage and beans

Main meal: Boil-in-the-bag lamb hotpot

Dessert: Chocolate roll with sauce; rice pudding

Additional food: boiled sweets, chocolate bars, fruit biscuits, digestive biscuits, pate for biscuits

Drinks: tea, coffee, soup, flavouring broth, squash concentrate

Other items: salt and pepper, tissues, matches, stove

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