Australian Reports of the Virus Spread

[dajop]

I guess this:

Loophole lets travellers into Aus from India

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has placed a pause on all flights from India, but there is still a sneaky loophole travellers from the COVID-19-ravaged nation can use to get into Australia.

www.news.com.au

If true, this underscores how political posturing can get in the way of sound outcomes.

Stop the flights, stop the flights! So you stop the flights into the lowest risk place to quarantine people (Howard Springs), get soundbite that demonstrates you are "tough" and still let people come into the places using HQ that are demonstrated to be highest risk.

Or am I being too harsh?

 

[Pushka]

Source?

Sorry. Did this post then had to dash but @bcworld sorted it.

 

[jase05]

Kane Richardson and Adam Zampa said they were flying back 2 or 3 days ago. I haven't heard if they are here yet but generally they manage to find flights.

Yes, they (or CA) paid for a charter flight home.

Post automatically merged: Apr 29, 2021

Well the Vic government are preparing for some form of arrival quarantine to still be around in 2-3 years time

 

[SydneySwan]

Yes, they (or CA) paid for a charter flight home.

For 2 people? Seems unlikely. CA said they aren't considering charter flights at this time.

 

[NM]

I'm so sorry to hear that. Hope the wedding reception was a winner.

Even the delayed reception still had some limitations. Was hosted in two sessions due to limits on numbers that could be present at one time.

In the end, I think they recognised some benefits in the low-key ceremony and the cost savings that resulted. But it would have been nice for at least those in the same city to attend. Our new daughter-in-law is from Europe and not only missed the opportunity for her family to be present, but they don't expect to be able to visit them for quite some time still to come. They originally planned to travel to Europe for the weeding, but that obviously was not going to happen, so they went ahead here. They are now just relieved to be married and living in an age where livestreaming events and video chats are easy and affordable.

So we are all waiting for international travel to be available again and they may still have a celebration event in Europe some time next year (or later) that we will try to attend with them - and meet the new family.

 

[jase05]

For 2 people? Seems unlikely. CA said they aren't considering charter flights at this time.

Hence why I said OR
Some chatter within the SACA this morning that their IPL franchises helped arrange the seats on the charter flight. Even if they had to foot the Bill themselves they aren’t short of a quid

 

[Pushka]

Even the delayed reception still had some limitations. Was hosted in two sessions due to limits on numbers that could be present at one time.

In the end, I think they recognised some benefits in the low-key ceremony and the cost savings that resulted. But it would have been nice for at least those in the same city to attend. Our new daughter-in-law is from Europe and not only missed the opportunity for her family to be present, but they don't expect to be able to visit them for quite some time still to come. They originally planned to travel to Europe for the weeding, but that obviously was not going to happen, so they went ahead here. They are now just relieved to be married and living in an age where livestreaming events and video chats are easy and affordable.

So we are all waiting for international travel to be available again and they may still have a celebration event in Europe some time next year (or later) that we will try to attend with them - and meet the new family.

I can only emphasise with you. Weddings are for families to get together and celebrate. Likely we will be in exactly the same boat.

 

[RAM]

yep, restrictions on the real heroes, open slather for the "footy heroes". It's profoundly wrong at any time, but an outright insult on ANZAC Day.

and of course, footy crowds are always much better behaved than those at Anzac Day Dawn Services or a march!

There is a great list of all Q breaches which gets updated as another one occurs:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1385211209511669767

BTW - the contact tracing never got to the bottom of the NSW Northern Beaches outbreak, still an official mystery.

One worrying fun fact one of the epidemiologists raised a couple of days back - there is one Q leak about every 250 CV infections. With the double digit daily rates of new CV cases in HQ - if the trend had continued that implied another leak next Monday. Implicitly suggested this was behind the final decision to 'pause' arrivals from India (theoretically).

A quick search on any flight finder engine unfortunately reveals a number of other countries are possible to travel from India via in order to reach Australia in addition to the named Qatar & China.

Hopefully a highly paid consultant won't charge too much to run that search for the Feds!

 

[Lynda2475]

That list doesn't tell complete story.

We need to be less concerned where HQ workers are identified before they have spread the virus to anyone else in the community.

Similarly whilst its awful that people have been infected whilst in HQ from neighboring rooms (and should be rightly furious and compensated) as long as it doesn't then spread beyond the hotel (as it did in WA) it isn't really of community concern.

A better view is to track total cases that resulted from each breach - the Vic 2nd Wave was 1000s whereas the others have been a handful at best.

Northern Beaches is suspected to have come from Flight Crew not HQ, but even it it was HQ the number of cases while relative high compared with other more recent breaches didn't results in any deaths or city/statewide lockdown.

Whilst there is much room for continued improvement with HQ it has largely worked, the only time it resulted in deaths was Vic 2nd wave.

 

[SydneySwan]

Qatar Airlines is still allowing people from India to board flights into Australia.

This article in the SMH seems to suggest otherwise. Also mentions that Richardson and Zampa due in Melbourne today without disclosing how.

‘They shut the avenue off’: Umpire Reiffel thwarted in bid to leave IPL

Former Test seamer turned umpire Paul Reiffel had his bags packed and tickets booked for a flight to Sydney from Doha only to be told he would have to stay in India.

www.smh.com.au

 

[Lynda2475]

Richardson and Zampa due in Melbourne today without disclosing how

Probably used the loophole (or pretended they were tennis players) before the government caught on and closed it. We all know sports people get special treatment especially in Victoria.

 

[Pushka]

This article in the SMH seems to suggest otherwise. Also mentions that Richardson and Zampa due in Melbourne today without disclosing how.

‘They shut the avenue off’: Umpire Reiffel thwarted in bid to leave IPL

Former Test seamer turned umpire Paul Reiffel had his bags packed and tickets booked for a flight to Sydney from Doha only to be told he would have to stay in India.

www.smh.com.au

Clearly that's just happened then. Well, that's unfortunate for him but just at the moment in that bubble he is safe but for Australia, and Australian quarantine is getting a little stretched right now. Be interesting to see what happens to the QR flight arriving into Adelaide, well, now I think!

 

[TheRealTMA]

Well, that's unfortunate for him but just at the moment in that bubble he is safe but for Australia, and Australian quarantine is getting a little stretched right now.

Perhaps should have taken a private jet to the Maldives like Bollywood stars. Not like they can’t afford it!

 

[Pushka]

Perhaps should have taken a private jet to the Maldives like Bollywood stares. Not like they can’t afford it!

I was thinking exactly that this morning. They could spend their dosh on a private charter to The Maldives and still have plenty left over. I had to laugh when the player said that CA could pay for the charter as they receive 10% of their contract payments. Ah, so not willing to fork out any of the remaining 90% then? Honestly, cricketers these days are pampered, umm, I'll leave it at pampered.

 

[SydneySwan]

Perhaps should have taken a private jet to the Maldives like Bollywood stars. Not like they can’t afford it!

This is nonsense. Paul Reiffel is an umpire. There is no way he would be able to afford that. The players in the IPL are well paid but not the umpires. Because of COVID all the top Australian umpires are earning much less than usual because of reduced opportunities to umpire overseas.

 

[Pushka]

This is nonsense. Paul Reiffel is an umpire. There is no way he would be able to afford that. The players in the IPL are well paid but not the umpires. Because of COVID all the top Australian umpires are earning much less than usual because of reduced opportunities to umpire overseas.

As a family man I'd expect his remuneration to be higher than normal due to Covid risk for him to take up the offer but certainly nowhere near the level of players. Several zeroes short. But I reckon @TheRealTMA was only thinking of the players.

 

[Solid]

They’ve also been confined to a bubble so more chance they catch it on flight then bring it back themselves.

 

[jonboixxx]

Bubble breach at Brisbane Airport blamed on human error

Two arrivals from Papua New Guinea were in the green zone for almost two hours after arriving in a red zone flight.

www.brisbanetimes.com.au

Bit of human error.

 

[Pushka]

They’ve also been confined to a bubble so more chance they catch it on flight then bring it back themselves.

They also wear full hazmat on internal flights.

Post automatically merged: Apr 29, 2021

Bubble breach at Brisbane Airport blamed on human error

Two arrivals from Papua New Guinea were in the green zone for almost two hours after arriving in a red zone flight.

www.brisbanetimes.com.au

Bit of human error.

Oh dear. Not New Zealand. Pop goes the bubble.

 

[Lynda2475]

How secure is the bubble really given need for cleaners, drovers, chefs etc. In such a crowded populous country the ability to keep a decent distance is not easy so many ways the bubble can be pierced.

I think any of the players, umpires etc who travelled to India recently were extremely foolish, the situation has been escalating for a while and people still disobeying lockdowns and mask wearing to attend religious festivals in the Ganges.