Tourists stranded as Sanya holiday turns into torment
TO Cai Jin, the long-anticipated family trip to the coastal city of Sanya has turned out to be “yesterday once more,” bringing back recent memories of every Shanghai resident.
The senior editor of a local newspaper has been put under lockdown at a hotel for two days in the popular tourist city in south China’s Hainan Province, following a severe COVID-19 outbreak and an urgent lockdown.
Cai and her family rushed to Sanya airport at 4am on Saturday right after hearing the local government’s lockdown announcement.
After finally getting on a plane to Shanghai, she and all the other 200 passengers were asked to get off due to an updated COVID-19 prevention and control order of Sanya — all tourists must undergo a week-long quarantine with five nucleic acid tests before leaving.
“I even heard the rumblings of the plane engines, but the captain said he was also stunned by the decision,” Cai recalled.
About 3,800 travelers like Cai were stranded at the Sanya Fenghuang International Airport on Saturday. They have been sent to 11 hotels for quarantine, where accommodation and food are provided free.
All departing flights and railway services in Sanya have been cancelled to contain the spread of the pandemic, which was triggered by the high-contagious Omicron BA.5.1.3 sub-variant of the coronavirus.
Citywide, about 80,000 tourists were stranded after the lockdown was launched at 6am on Saturday.
For many, the holiday trip could extend indefinitely.
Sanya reported 182 positive COVID-19 cases yesterday, including 78 asymptomatic cases. Since the first case was detected on August 1, a total of 1,140 infections have been reported, according to Hainan’s latest COVID-19 press briefing.
Cai and her family were shifted to a five-star resort hotel at the Dadonghai tourism spot that she said was the best of the worst.
They have free buffet breakfast and packed meals for lunch and dinner.
Since the area she lives is still free of COVID-19 cases, Cai and other tourists are allowed to walk around and even shop at nearby stores.
Her family trip to Sanya from July 27 was happy and relaxed at the beginning, when they dived, surfed and visited some small islands around.
The situation became tight from August 3 when more people were seen wearing masks and most tourism spots were shut.
They were scheduled to return home on August 4, but the local government issued an urgent stipulation that two PCR negative reports made within 48 hours are required to enter the airport, which was then impossible for the family.
Over 3,000 medical teams have rushed to Sanya to support the fight against the pandemic and the mass nucleic acid screening.
They include 210 medics from Shanghai, who arrived at the Haikou Meilan International Airport yesterday afternoon.