About 100 Hongkongers evacuated from Diamond Princess free to leave Fo Tan quarantine centre on Thursday

Hongkongers from Diamond Princess who had taken the first government-chartered flight home will be released on Thursday

From Wednesday night, Fo Tan quarantine centre will accommodate 533 city residents now stranded in mainland China’s Hubei

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The Chun Yeung Estate in Fo Tan, where passengers evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan are being quarantined. Photo: Winson Wong

Published: 11:00am, 4 Mar 2020Updated: 11:20am, 4 Mar 2020

About 100 Hongkongers evacuated from the coronavirus-stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship will finally be free to leave the quarantine facilities at Fo Tan in Sha Tin in the early hours of Thursday.

They will be allowed to walk out of the Chun Yeung public housing estate after completing a mandatory 14-day quarantine following their return from Japan.

The housing estate will from Wednesday night accommodate 533 Hongkongers due to return on government-chartered flights from Hubei province in mainland China, the epicentre of the Covid-19 outbreak.

Some of the passengers of Diamond Princess confined at the facilities were eager to leave, as they had already been quarantined on the cruise liner since February 4, before they took the flight back home on February 20.

“I have just been trying to roll with the punches,” David Yeung Kun-wah, 70, said over the phone from his room that has some furniture but no television. “My friends are constantly sending me messages of support.”