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Agence France-Presse

The first plane carrying passengers from the hantavirus-hit cruise ship left Spain’s Canary Islands on Sunday for Madrid, where they will be taken to a military hospital.
Spanish nationals were the first to leave the MV Hondius, which remains anchored off Tenerife, the largest island in the Spanish archipelago off the coast of West Africa. The ship arrived hours earlier.
None of the more than 140 people on the Hondius have shown symptoms of the virus, Spain’s health ministry, the World Health Organization and cruise company Oceanwide Expeditions said.
Those disembarking and personnel working at the port of Granadilla in Tenerife were wearing protective gear during the evacuation process, including face masks, hazmat suits and respirators.
“The entire operation is proceeding normally,” Spanish Health Minister Mónica García said.
Passengers and some crew members from more than 20 nationalities on board will be evacuated throughout Sunday and into Monday.
After reaching Madrid, those evacuated on the first plane will be under quarantine, Spanish health authorities say. Only the 14 Spanish nationals on board will quarantine in the country.

Three passengers from the MV Hondius – a Dutch husband and wife and a German woman – have died, while others have fallen sick with the rare disease, which usually spreads among rodents.
No vaccines or specific treatments exist for hantavirus, which is endemic in Argentina, where the ship departed in April.
But health officials have stressed that the risk for global public health is low and played down comparisons to a repeat of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The final flight to evacuate most of the ship’s passengers and crew will leave for Australia on Monday, before the ship continues to the Netherlands, García said.
Passengers wearing blue medical suits began disembarking the Dutch-flagged vessel onto smaller boats to reach the port of Granadilla on Tenerife, according to journalists at the scene.
The evacuees then boarded a red Spanish army bus and travelled to Tenerife South airport in a convoy with Civil Guard vehicles. A protective board separated the driver from the passengers.
The evacuees changed into new protective equipment before boarding their repatriation flight, the first of which left carrying 14 Spaniards who will observe quarantine at a military hospital in Madrid.
“The operation is going very well,” World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters at the port.
Garcia said a Dutch flight that would also take citizens from Germany, Belgium, Greece and part of the crew would follow the Spanish departure.

Separate flights for Canadian, Turkish, French, British, Irish and US citizens are also planned for Sunday.
Race against time
Regional authorities have warned that the operation must be completed by Monday, when adverse weather will force the ship to leave.
Canary Islands regional authorities have consistently resisted taking in the ship, which was only authorised to anchor offshore instead of docking in the port.
But all passengers are asymptomatic and underwent a final medical assessment before their disembarkation, Garcia told reporters on Tenerife shortly before the operation began.
Spanish authorities have insisted there will be no contact with the local population in Tenerife.
Journalists at Granadilla saw white tents erected along the quay and that the police, some in protective medical suits, had sealed off part of the small industrial port.
Spain “is doing what it must do, with technical and scientific rigour and full transparency, with institutional loyalty and with international cooperation”, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said on Sunday.
Pope Leo, who is due to visit the Canary Islands next month, thanked the Atlantic archipelago for its solidarity during a Sunday prayer at the Vatican.
International concern
The only hantavirus type that is transmissible between humans – the Andes virus – has been confirmed among those who have tested positive, fuelling international concern.




The WHO said on Friday it had confirmed six cases out of eight suspected ones. There are no suspected cases remaining on the ship.
The MV Hondius had arrived at Tenerife early on Sunday morning from Cabo Verde, where three infected people had been evacuated to Europe earlier in the week.
It left Ushuaia, Argentina on April 1 for a cruise across the Atlantic Ocean to Cabo Verde.
The WHO believes the first infection occurred before the start of the expedition, followed by transmission between humans on board the vessel.
But Argentine provincial health official Juan Petrina has said there was an “almost zero chance” the Dutch man linked to the outbreak contracted the disease in Ushuaia based on the virus’s weeks-long incubation period, among other factors.
Health authorities in several countries have been tracking passengers who had already disembarked and anyone who may have come into contact with them.


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The cruise ship MV Hondius arrives at the port of Granadilla de Abona in Tenerife, Spain, on Sunday. Photo: Reuters

Passengers and crew aboard the MV Hondius after arriving at the port of Granadilla on Sunday. Photo: AP

A view of a tent of a mobile medical facility set up at the port of Granadilla de Abona, where the cruise ship MV Hondius is expected to dock. Photo: Reuters

Spanish civil guard officers stand guard in the area where passengers from the MV Hondius cruise ship are expected to arrive at the port of Granadilla in Tenerife, Spain’s Canary Islands, on Saturday. Photo: AP

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Passengers on the MV Hondius, scan the horizon with binoculars during their voyage to Spain’s port of Tenerife on  Wednesday. Photo: AP

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About 150 people will be flown home as the MV Hondius arrived near the port of Granadilla in Tenerife


About 150 people will be flown home as the MV Hondius arrived near the port of Granadilla in Tenerife.


Hantavirus-hit cruise passengers evacuate from Spanish port with WHO aid

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}About 150 people will be flown home as the MV Hondius arrived near the port of Granadilla in Tenerife

About 150 people will be flown home as the MV Hondius arrived near the port of Granadilla in Tenerife