As unrest in Egypt escalated into violence, UCLA moved quickly to get its students and staff there out of the way. The school responded to a U.S. State Department evacuation order for Americans in Egypt.
About 30 UCLA students and archeology faculty and staff boarded a charter flight from Cairo to Barcelona. The 19 students had planned to begin a study-abroad program this week at the American University in Cairo, and the 11-member archaeology team had been working on a dig about 200 miles south of the city.
A University of California representative says the group expects to return to the United States later this week. A University of Southern California spokesman says a USC student in Cairo also has safely left the country.
The State Department has told non-essential government staff and dependents to leave Egypt, and officials at the U.S. embassy in Cairo say they plan to evacuate more than 1,000 Americans from the country by the end of this week.