Relieved parents Patrick and Sally Lort-Phillips, of Market Lavington, welcomed back their daughter, Alexandra, after she was caught up in the raid by Israeli forces on a ship taking aid to the people of Gaza.

Ms Lort-Phillips, 37, arrived at Heathrow Airport on Sunday to be met by her parents and brother, Charles, 30. She spent a few days at her parents’ home in High Street.

She was uninjured in the violent raid which left nine people dead on board the Turkish ferry, Mavi Marmara, almost two weeks ago but was shocked at the assault by the Israeli forces.

She said: “It was very surreal, terrifying and noisy. I came out of a room – I was trying to send an email – and on to the deck. There was a helicopter overhead and I saw rafts coming up the side of the ship.

“A massive number of injured people started coming down from the upper deck. They were horrendously bloody. I was racing around helping injured people.

“With another person, I took a stretcher on to the upper deck where there were casualties. We put a guy on to the stretcher, he had been shot in the head but wasn’t alive.”

Ms Lort-Phillips and the other people on board were detained in Be’er Sheva prison in Israel before being flown to Istanbul where she underwent medical checks.

Ms Lort-Phillips, who lives in Hackney, London, went to Gaza delivering aid last December and despite this atrocity is determined to return. She gave up her job with a youth offending team in London shortly before she left for Gaza again last month.

She said: “I will definitely return to Gaza. Myself and others on board the ship are already planning the next convoy. The people in Gaza are waiting for us.”

She also said she was thinking about doing aid work for IHH, a Turkish organisation, to help orphans across the world.

Her parents thanked the British Consulate in Tel Aviv and the Turkish Government for their assistance.

Her 66-year-old father Patrick, a retired Army lieutenant colonel, said: “It was obviously a very traumatic experience for Alexandra, innocent civilians are unprepared for that. It was wonderful to see her arriving at the airport, she looked pretty well and she was looked after very well in Turkey.”

Her mother Sally, 63, said: “Alexandra was pleased the situation in Gaza had got publicity which is typical of her.”