Hundreds of thousands of Aussies return since March

MORE than 330,000 Australians have returned home from around the world since the COVID-19 pandemic travel emergency started on March 13.

Despite the NSW Government’s limit of 450 arrivals a day at Sydney Airport and no more than 50 on any one plane, 15 international flights landed into Sydney over the weekend – including two from China – with another 10 expected on Monday.

As NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian yesterday defended the state’s move to charge returning Aussies $3000 for their 14-day mandatory quarantine she said she had heard anecdotal reports of people leaving Australia and returning a number of times.

She said Australian citizens and permanent residents have known for three to four months to consider coming back.

“This is a way in which we can make sure that people think carefully about what their options are in the future,” she said.

NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard has said that with the current crisis in Victoria and with Queensland now charging for hotel quarantine, some returning travellers were changing their plans and landing in Sydney for the two-week quarantine.

The planes landing at Sydney over the weekend and on Monday from Doha, Singapore, Tokyo, Guangzhou, Xiamen, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Abu Dhabi, Doha, Dubai, Colombo and Auckland are mostly empty.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said on Sunday that 26,000 of the 330,000 travellers who have come back since March 13, had been helped by DFAT to return on 317 flights, 63 of them facilitated by the government in unprecedented moves where there were no commercial options.

The largest cohorts of Australians who have needed government help have come from Bangladesh, India, Lebanon, Nepal, Philippines, Peru, South Africa, and Thailand.

They have included people from Fiji and Vanuatu on a combination of private charters and ADF-facilitated humanitarian flights and 112 Australian and New Zealand passengers from the Greg Mortimer cruise ship in Uruguay – many of whom were COVID-19 positive.

The government on March 18 raised the travel advice for anywhere overseas to the top level of “Do not travel”.