Family's relief at Lebanon escape

Trudy Hindi and two of her girls leave HMS Bulwark in Cyprus

A mother who escaped the fighting in Lebanon with her three young daughters on a UK warship has spoken of her terror at being caught in the conflict.

Trudy Hindi, 41, of Bridgend, south Wales, was "petrified" when bombs began going off in the town an hour from Beirut where they were staying.

Mrs Hindi also described the taxi journey to their evacuation as "eerie".

"There were no other cars anywhere. It was (like) literally we were the only people on the planet alive," she said.

"Travelling down this road knowing a bomb could go off at any second, or we could be air-fired at any second was very, very frightening," said Mrs Hindi.

I had to try to cover that to show them that there was nothing to worry about, that it was all going to be okay Trudy Hindi on hiding her fear from her daughters

She and Sarafina, 13, Samantha, 10, and Samara, eight, had gone to stay with her in-laws for the summer when the fighting between Israel and militant group Hezbollah broke out, leaving her husband chef back in Wales.

The bombs fell close to where they were staying and Mrs Hindi said the walls of the house were shaking.

She said she was petrified, "but I had to try to cover that to show them that there was nothing to worry about, that it was all going to be okay.

"That if anything did go wrong, we were together, that the four of us were together and that if anything did happen it would happen to the four of us.

'Very long day'

"Just keeping that under cover was difficult in itself," she said.

Mrs Hindi spoke to her husband Jamal in Wales three or four times a day as the conflict escalated.

The family are relieved to be united at home

With her father-in-law, he managed to organise a taxi for the family to reach Beirut, where the UK warship HMS Bulwark was waiting to take British refugees to Cyprus.

As they drove down they could see helicopters and Israeli warships lined up in the sea, she said.

The family arrived in Limassol on Friday and Mrs Hindi described the journey from Lebanon as "amazing".

"We were all given a little number so that they could process us. I was put into a special area as I have problems with my back."

She said it was "very, very difficult" on the ship, with "hundreds and hundreds and hundreds" of people everywhere.

"To try to get to the toilet in the night it was like playing hopscotch over bodies.

"It was a very long day, but we eventually arrived in Cyprus which was fine. "

The Hindis are now recovering from their ordeal in Bridgend with Jamal.

Mrs Hindi said she was relieved it was over, but she was "saddened" her husband's family were still in Lebanon caught up in the fighting.