A native of Coolebeg, Cloontuskert, County Galway, McLoughlin was the centre of an international event when she was taken hostage in Ethiopia in 1984.
There are people lying in their own diarrhoea with all sorts of diseases like malaria, dysentery, typhoid, relapsing fever and the babies suffer from hypothermia because of the extreme night and day temperatures.
They were forced to walk over the mountains or ride mules till they reached the militant's camp.
However, the Tigrayan had not intended to harm the volunteers, their purpose been to bring world attention to the famine.
McLoughlin later worked as a teacher in Tanzania, where she met James O'Loughlin of Ballinrobe, and later married.