In the blink of a hurricane’s eye, the city of New Orleans was nearly brought to ruins.

Those who visited the city before Aug. 29 – the day Hurricane Katrina hit – we will remember New Orleans as the home of Mardi Gras, Creole cuisine and Bourbon Street, but for several students the city will be remembered in a different way.

In the days following Katrina, 11 students in the Ohio Army National Guard were called to duty and flown to New Orleans and parts of Mississippi to assist in relief and recovery efforts.

The students belong to Company B of the 1st Battalion of the 148th Infantry Regiment, which is based in Bowling Green.

Those who were flown to New Orleans returned by Sept. 21 with fresh memories of the destruction and turmoil the city had endured.

“It was a shock to see that kind of devastation in an American city,” said Sgt. Terry Czerwien, a senior from Perrysburg.

Czerwien arrived at the New Orleans Naval Air Station on Sept. 1, his 28th birthday.

The next morning, he and 25 other soldiers from Company B boarded a twin rotor helicopter and flew to the New Orleans Superdome, where thousands of people were still stranded.

Soldiers of the Ohio National Guard’s 1-148th regiment were the first out-of-state soldiers to assist in the evacuation of the Superdome, according to their Web site.

The stadium was in bad shape when they arrived.

“When we walked in to the place it was just utterly destroyed,” said Spc. Chad Roper, a junior from Toledo.

Beer cans, garbage piles and human waste covered the floor of the stadium, creating a putrid stench that was intensified by the extreme humidity, Roper said.

“It was horrible,” said Spc. Derrick Timmerman, a sophomore from Celina. “I can’t even start to explain how bad it smelled.”

The smell wasn’t the only thing on their minds though, as there were still thousands of stranded residents living in the stadium.

“There were so many people there,” said Roper, who estimated that there were well over 5,000 people still living in the stadium when they arrived on Sept. 2.

“They had totally reverted to almost an animal state,” Roper said. “I’ve never seen humanity slip that far. I felt like I was on the other side of the earth. It didn’t seem like the United States at all.”

There were numerous unconfirmed reports of rape, vandalism and violence inside the Superdome.

Roper, 23, witnessed several fights himself, and he even had people come up to him and claim their children had been molested.

Despite the sordid conditions in the Superdome, the guardsmen did their best to assist the people in whatever way they could.

“When I was down there I just had the mindset that I had to do my job,” said 21-year-old Timmerman.

The soldiers passed out food and water, loaded people onto buses and served as additional security.

“The news was portraying that everyone was starving, but there was food and water everywhere,” said Roper, who believes the presence of alcohol was a bigger problem. “There was so much booze floating around that people were getting dehydrated.”

Luckily, a triage center was set up just outside the stadium for the sick and injured as they waited to be evacuated.

It took the soldiers three days to completely evacuate the Superdome. Many of the evacuees were taken to the Astrodome in Houston and then relocated from there.

The soldiers from Company B then traveled to the eastern part of New Orleans where they stayed in a private school located along Lake Pontchartrain.

On Aug. 30 the lake’s waters had poured into the city through the breached levees, flooding 80 percent of the city.

While at the school, the soldiers initiated search and rescue missions in a nearby, designated sector of the city, going door to door to look for survivors.

This sometimes required them to use small boats, as parts of the city were still flooded.

“It’s totally different seeing it in person, rather than watching it on TV,” said Timmerman, referring to the dilapidated neighborhoods they navigated through during their searches.

Besides contaminated floodwaters, the soldiers encountered downed power lines and trees, crumbling houses, starving dogs and even a couple bodies.

Despite their grim surroundings, the guardsmen rescued several people who had managed to survive in the squalid conditions.

The soldiers also went on roving patrols through some of the neighborhoods to deter criminal activity.

Most of the buildings suffered substantial damage from the winds and floodwaters and will probably have to be torn down, Czerwien said. Many of them were already covered with mold and mildew.

“My heart goes out to all the people whose homes have been destroyed,” said Roper. “They’re lives are in shambles.”

Roper was half expecting his own life to be in disarray, not knowing how long they would have to remain on duty.

He was on duty for an entire year after the terrorist attacks in 2001, and he just returned home in March after spending several months in Kosovo.

Roper’s was in the process of withdrawing from school when he learned he would be back home by Sept. 22.

Roper admitted that it is difficult being a student and having to just drop everything when he is called for duty, but he is glad he could help in New Orleans.

“We accomplished a lot,” Roper said.