Predictions of when international flights may resume/bans lifted

[drron]

The Tassie premier has announced that he has reached an agreement with SA on a travel bubble but no date given and I doubt any airline will be interested.
Although if Rex have a spare plane they just might fly you in to BWT.Then twice a week an unidentified plane has been flying direct from LST to YPED-RAAF Edinburgh.
I doubt that you could get a ticket for that flight.

Also when I flew down to Tassie I was not allowed to overnight in MEL by the government which is why I flew on the Monday when I normally fly on a Sunday to a job.Sunday no connections.Saturday and Monday there were.The hospital then said Monday.

 

[Pushka]

I’d be very surprised if we opened this month unfortunately. The state of emergency ends on June 28th and think they will announce a July 3rd re-opening. Might be a small chance of opening to select states earlier IMO

That's fine. We are looking at August after school holidays anyway. And work will require a trip in July although after the rally I'm not sure I give a toss anymore.

Post automatically merged: Jun 8, 2020

The Tassie premier has announced that he has reached an agreement with SA on a travel bubble but no date given and I doubt any airline will be interested.
Although if Rex have a spare plane they just might fly you in to BWT.Then twice a week an unidentified plane has been flying direct from LST to YPED-RAAF Edinburgh.
I doubt that you could get a ticket for that flight.

Also when I flew down to Tassie I was not allowed to overnight in MEL by the government which is why I flew on the Monday when I normally fly on a Sunday to a job.Sunday no connections.Saturday and Monday there were.The hospital then said Monday.

Yeah. Not in winter.

 

[Himeno]

I had been planning a 1-2 week trip to Japan for early May. I was sitting on plans thinking if I should pull the trigger and start booking things (and putting in for the Japanese event ticket lottos) in Feb when things started getting locked down, so clearly that didn't happen.
The events I planned to go to were later cancelled anyway.

The alternate trip plans I had were for events in Japan or LA in early July. (same weekend for both options)
Those events have been cancelled.

I'm going to reach 8 weeks annual leave around Oct/Nov, at which point, work will deem it "excessive" and try to force me to take leave. I'm not going to take leave when there isn't anything to do because I can't travel overseas.
I've had a 5-7 week round the world trip each year since 2006, with the trip being sometime between late Sep and early Dec for the past 7 or 8 years. It doesn't look like that's going to happen this year.

I can see NZ and some other South Pacific nations opening up for travel by Jul/Aug and parts of Asia in Oct. Maybe parts of Europe by Dec/Jan.
With the lack of useful Covid response by the US and Brazil governments, combined with the current protests in the US, I don't see American nations being allowed for Australian travel any time soon. eg, even with the AU travel warnings being relaxed from the global Level 5 - Biosecurity Act ban, I don't see the western hemisphere being lowered beyond Level 4, with the possible exception of Canada, if the Canada-US land border remains closed.

By xmas, I think we might see the South Pacific on level 1 or 2 warnings, most of Asia on level 2 or 3, EU on 2 or 3 - depending on what happens with the internal Schengen borders vs amount of Covid cases active, UK on 3 or 4 and most of the Americas on level 4. No idea about Africa.

 

[jase05]

Not liking my chances of travel to NZ anytime soon with PM Ardern saying that relaxation of entry ban would be from selected Pacific Islands and that consideration related to elimination, which was not Australia’s policy

 

[NM]

Not liking my chances of travel to NZ anytime soon with PM Ardern saying that relaxation of entry ban would be from selected Pacific Islands and that consideration related to elimination, which was not Australia’s policy

Agree. And I just wish Qantas would take action and actually cancel their flights for July that are still showing as operating and bookable. Then I can start the refund waiting cycle. I expect they don't how far ahead to cancel flights, so waiting as long as they can to make a decision, which is obviously in their favour from a refund timing perspective too.

 

[drron]

So the EU looks likely to extend the ban on people from outside the EU and associate countries until at least July 1st.Therefore unlikely Iceland and Greece will reopen as advertised.

External European Border Closure Extended To July 1

The external borders of 30+ European countries (including Iceland and Greece) will remain closed until at least July. Here are the details.

onemileatatime.com

Sri Lanka though is going to open up in August but quite a few restrictions including needing an online visa costing $US100.

Sri Lanka Requiring Visitors To Get Up To Four COVID-19 Tests

Sri Lanka will welcome tourists from around the globe as of August 1, though with lots of restrictions, including up to four COVID-19 tests.

onemileatatime.com

And IATA putting out a map of Covid restrictions and bans.

Interactive Coronavirus Travel Regulations Map

Want to know if a country is allowing visitors right now in light of coronavirus? Here's a useful map with all the restrictions.

onemileatatime.com

 

[auriga]

Not liking my chances of travel to NZ anytime soon with PM Ardern saying that relaxation of entry ban would be from selected Pacific Islands and that consideration related to elimination, which was not Australia’s policy

Yes, I feel this trans Tasman bubble increasingly improbable.
Considering that NZ is looking at relaxing ALL distancing restrictions.
Will Australia reach that point in the coming months?

 

[Gremlin]

Yes, I feel this trans Tasman bubble increasingly improbable.
Considering that NZ is looking at relaxing ALL distancing restrictions.
Will Australia reach that point in the coming months?

Done as of midnight last night.

 

[CityRail]

Not liking my chances of travel to NZ anytime soon with PM Ardern saying that relaxation of entry ban would be from selected Pacific Islands and that consideration related to elimination, which was not Australia’s policy

If NZ's policy is elimination, then why Trans-Tasman Travel bubble?

Why not Australian-Asia travel bubble? Remember Australia has a lot of Asians living and we desperately needing to go back to where we come from!

 

[dajop]

I think bubbles seem to be quite a pipedream. Even within Australia, we only have two states and a territory aligned on approach to borders, five don't, It's not going to be easier to get disparate nations to agree to a common approach to trans-border travel..

 

[DC3]

I think bubbles seem to be quite a pipedream ....

Someone just had a thought-bubble at one point. If it ever happens, we are nowhere near it as yet.

 

[N860CR]

I think bubbles seem to be quite a pipedream. Even within Australia, we only have two states and a territory aligned on approach to borders, five don't, It's not going to be easier to get disparate nations to agree to a common approach to trans-border travel..

I would tend to agree. I personally don’t see bubbles taking off. I keep repeating it, but the plan was to “flatten the curve” and manage infection rates (like we do with every single other virus). Elimination isn’t going to happen and hasn’t been planned for.

I believe we’ll just get to a point where we need to live with it in some form and we’ll return to open borders with appropriate screening rather than unmanageable “bubbles”

 

[CityRail]

I would tend to agree. I personally don’t see bubbles taking off. I keep repeating it, but the plan was to “flatten the curve” and manage infection rates (like we do with every single other virus). Elimination isn’t going to happen and hasn’t been planned for.

I believe we’ll just get to a point where we need to live with it in some form and we’ll return to open borders with appropriate screening rather than unmanageable “bubbles”

Exactly right. I think even NZ has eliminated the disease, someday it still need to reopen its borders unless they plan for indefinite closure until the whole COVID-19 thing is eliminated from the world, which is not realistic.

According to the following article, it appears that the Travel Bubble they are planning is not only for Trans-Tasman, but perhaps would be expanded to Taiwan and Cook Islands where there are very low cases or no cases exist.

Other nations in NZ travel bubble plan

As New Zealand appears to have completely eradicated the coronavirus – at least for now – all eyes are on when Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern will open the trans-Tasman travel bubble to Australia.

www.news.com.au

Back in Australia, I think we are on track to remove the virus from Community Transmission, as NSW records 11 days without community transmission and the only state which has is Victoria, which they have start recording no cases.

I think down the track we will see Australia eliminated community transmissions within a few weeks time and that should be sufficient for NZ to reopen their borders at us, hopefully 2 months from now. Seems like July is still not realistic if we are to adhere to their goal of eliminating the virus here in Australia, as we still have quite a number of overseas imported cases every now and then.

 

[CityRail]

Yes, I feel this trans Tasman bubble increasingly improbable.
Considering that NZ is looking at relaxing ALL distancing restrictions.
Will Australia reach that point in the coming months?

Very unlikely. Take note that Australia has a lot more return travellers from high risk countries such as Pakistan, India and the UK, which according to the latest survey on the media, we do detect COVID-19 from these travellers quite frequently.

Therefore I would say that we won't be able to eliminating the virus.

However, I predict in a month's time we should have eliminated the community transmission of the disease safely, which means that we can safely go to step 3 by July Winter School Holidays with domestic travel.

 

[drron]

Don't be surprised if a case or 2 of the virus turns up in NZ in the next few weeks.We know there are asymptomatic cases more frequently in the younger generations.they are not even being advised to socially distance so will be able to spread the virus easily.

 

[CityRail]

Don't be surprised if a case or 2 of the virus turns up in NZ in the next few weeks.We know there are asymptomatic cases more frequently in the younger generations.they are not even being advised to socially distance so will be able to spread the virus easily.

I agree, and I think the Australian response has been a lot more realistic than that of NZ.

When NZ said they have eliminated the virus, even there are no asymptomatic people, there will be returned travelers with virus somehow and they will once again have a case or two here or there.

Australia, in the meantime, maintain a few cases from time to time and therefore we have been able on higher alert than NZ. To be honest I would be more concerned if NZ has an outbreak due to their celebration of their COVID elimination than us in Australia where we still have some cases and able to live COVID safe.

 

[Flashback]

So the EU looks likely to extend the ban on people from outside the EU and associate countries until at least July 1st.Therefore unlikely Iceland and Greece will reopen as advertised.

External European Border Closure Extended To July 1

The external borders of 30+ European countries (including Iceland and Greece) will remain closed until at least July. Here are the details.

onemileatatime.com

Sri Lanka though is going to open up in August but quite a few restrictions including needing an online visa costing $US100.

Sri Lanka Requiring Visitors To Get Up To Four COVID-19 Tests

Sri Lanka will welcome tourists from around the globe as of August 1, though with lots of restrictions, including up to four COVID-19 tests.

onemileatatime.com

And IATA putting out a map of Covid restrictions and bans.

Interactive Coronavirus Travel Regulations Map

Want to know if a country is allowing visitors right now in light of coronavirus? Here's a useful map with all the restrictions.

onemileatatime.com

I wonder how the Sri Lanka thing will work for transit only passengers. Will they let you on the plane knowing you won't be entering or still demand it even for transit passengers?

That being said, I fully expect my Aug flights AUH to CGK via CMB to be cancelled but we will see.

 

[OATEK]

Don't be surprised if a case or 2 of the virus turns up in NZ in the next few weeks.We know there are asymptomatic cases more frequently in the younger generations.they are not even being advised to socially distance so will be able to spread the virus easily.

Mind you, the W.H.O. seems to be suggesting asymptomatic cases are not particularly infectious.

 

[drron]

Mind you, the W.H.O. seems to be suggesting asymptomatic cases are not particularly infectious.

Though antibody testing in California and New York suggests there are many more that have had Covid than have symptoms.So even if they are less infectious because there are a lot of them the numbers infected would not be insignificant.

 

[N860CR]

Though antibody testing in California and New York suggests there are many more that have had Covid than have symptoms.So even if they are less infectious because there are a lot of them the numbers infected would not be insignificant.

Touch wood, this is how the situation will end up resolving itself. It will end up reducing in severity and we'll just treat it like every other virus