The ‘Hondius’ will not touch land in the Canary Islands and passengers will disembark at sea

The cruise ship Hondius will enter, as planned, the Canary Islands next Sunday, at the industrial port of Granadilla but will not dock on land. The Government of Spain has responded to the request made by the Canary Islands from the first day it was known that the cruise ship was going to be diverted to the islands and it will remain anchored, moreover not for long.

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Sources close to the matter explain that, pending confirmation of the cause that triggered the hantavirus outbreak among the passengers and clarification of whether the cause is outside or inside the ship, “the most prudent” is that the ship does not touch land.

Not docking is the safest way to avoid any kind of incident on the coast, these sources point out. Furthermore, the intention is for the ship to set sail again to the Netherlands quickly, as soon as all passengers disembark, who will do so in the same way as the three injured who were evacuated in Cape Verde and taken to Amsterdam.

A tugboat will be responsible for transferring passengers by nationality from the Hondius to land but, only if the chartered plane that will take them to their country is already at the airport.

The vessel will pick them up at the side door of the cruise ship in an operation at sea and take them to the dock, to a restricted area. Something that the port itself allows due to its low operation and activity. From there they will be transferred in a vehicle – presumably a Samur ambulance with Foreign Health personnel – to a specific area of the airport and from there to the plane chartered by their government and to their country.

This will be done with all of them. No one will disembark from the cruise ship until their plane is on the airport runway waiting and the highest guarantees are given, according to the president of the Government of the Canary Islands, Fernando Clavijo, after holding a meeting with the Minister of Health, Mónica García, and the Minister of Territorial Policy, Ángel Víctor Torres, to determine the protocol to follow.

Clavijo left satisfied after his request was attended to. “That it anchors is very good news because vectors of possible contagion and risk decrease,” he pointed out. All workers, both in health care and at the airport or in the state security forces or bodies involved in the operation will be equipped with the corresponding PPE.

Sources close to the matter point out that, since covid, tests and training on how to put on and take off this PPE are carried out periodically, so the staff is prepared. It is not expected that personnel from the autonomous community will participate in the operation. “We will be informed but as long as the Government of Spain, which has external competence, does not require us, we will not participate,” Clavijo said.

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Before leaving the Hondius and taking the tugboat that will take them ashore, passengers will undergo epidemiological tests to verify that they are not infected with the virus. For this purpose, two WHO specialists are traveling on the ship. These tests are already being carried out with some regularity on the journey from Cape Verde to the Canary Islands and this information is reported to the Government of Spain and, since yesterday, to the regional Executive.

In the last part of the trip, tests will be carried out every 12 hours in order to know the situation at all times and when tourists arrive on the islands to know if they are asymptomatic or show any symptoms, as Clavijo explained yesterday. If the second case occurs and someone arrives sick on the islands, the plan would be altered and they would be referred to the Candelaria hospital and, specifically, to the high-risk isolation unit that was created after the pandemic. “With that monitoring we will see their real situation,” he said.

The ship’s crew is another story. They will not even get off the Hondius in the Canary Islands. Clavijo requested yesterday from the Government that, if they do not show symptoms or are not sick, they continue the journey on board the cruise ship to the Netherlands once the passengers have disembarked. This request, which was not fully accepted by the Minister of Health, Mónica García, and generated intense debate at the meeting, will be analyzed today in a meeting of Clavijo with the consul, Stanley Weytjens, and the deputy ambassador, Daniël Kooij.

“If there is no crew member who needs medical attention, they should not disembark and should continue with their ship to the Netherlands,” Clavijo explained. He clarified that making a crew change would involve disinfecting the ship while anchored off the archipelago’s coasts. “We do not want that. The shipowner and the flag country have their responsibility and that crew must continue their journey to the Netherlands,” Clavijo said. The minister “agreed to negotiate it” and the Canarian president will ask the ambassador today.

Rejection of the ship’s arrival continues to grow on the islands although the news yesterday that it will not touch the Canary coasts was very well received. The Secretary General of Civil Protection of the Ministry of the Interior, Virginia Barcones, conveyed yesterday her “absolute calm” to the Canarian population regarding the disembarkation operation.

“They will be absolutely isolated from the civilian population, they will arrive at an area that is completely isolated and fenced, they will get into isolated and guarded vehicles and will arrive at an area of the airport that will be completely isolated, they will get on the planes and leave,” she stressed.

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