Hampshire family horrified to see men fighting over rescue boat during Rhodes fire evacuation

• Holidaymaker Sarah Roberts has been recalling how local people helped their family escape from Rhodes.

A family from Hedge End in Hampshire have described how they spent 36 hours fleeing to safety from the wildfires on the Greek island of Rhodes.

Sarah Roberts was travelling with her mother and her two children - as well as her partner and his adult son - when they were caught up in the chaos.

What had begun as a happy family holiday soon spiralled into near disaster, as they had to walk for miles to escape.

Sarah explained: "It was so touch and go. There were times when I literally thought, that's it, we can't do anything else, there's no help. But we're here and I'm so grateful for that.

"I don't care about luggage, I don't care about belongings. We left everything there but we are here and that just means everything."

After warnings appeared on their phones telling them to evacuate, they took refuge on the beach amid the smoke and ash.

• Sarah said they are grateful to the local people on the island that helped them

Sarah said she was concerned for her mother, who has a serious lung condition.

She said: "It was horrific. I can't describe to you how scared I was personally...because I had a nine year old boy, a six year old girl and my mum with with me who has COPD (a breathing problem).

"The smoke for me was the scariest thing because I know it could overcome her quite quickly."

The family had to walk for miles along beaches and at one point found a rescue boat. But, Sarah said she was horrified to see grown men fighting to get to the front of the queue for spaces onboard.

"There was a mad scramble for this boat and it was disgusting - you saw the worst in people, you really did. There was quite a lot of us standing back and just thinking, we want our kids to be on there.

"At one point I said to my mum, 'take Ella's hand and take Cameron and don't let them go'. I said 'get out of here' because I wanted them to be safe."

But the family couldn't get onboard so decided to stay together on land, battling temperatures of well over 40 degrees and a lack of food and water.

Eventually they managed to get a lift from a hotel worker to a beach that was much safer.

From there they were then later able to get a coach to the airport, where they faced a further traumatic and tiring 36-hour wait.

• Cameron, 9, said he tried to stay brave throughout the ordeal

Sarah's nine year old son Cameron said he did his best to stay brave throughout the whole experience.

It included Sarah - who is a nurse - helping a Greek maid who had passed out because of the heat. That kindness was more than repaid by the help they received from residents.

Sarah has said that while they want compensation if the six suitcases that they had to abandon aren't returned to them their priority is being back safe and sound.

The family say they will be forever grateful to those on the island and what they did to help them.