Chinese seafarers stranded as ships remain adrift in coronavirus limbo
- Close to 35,000 cruise ship workers are stuck on the high seas as ports turn vessels away to prevent a wave of imported cases
- While some countries have repatriated their nationals, China has not indicated it will do so as it battles new infections in its capital
Coco has no idea when she will see her parents again. The 30-year-old, who works for an international cruise line, was meant to return to her family in north China in March – but she and the rest of her crewmates are currently stranded in the Mediterranean Sea. It has been a long nine months since the Chinese national, who asked to be identified by her English name, set out to sea.
There are many of us out at sea for months and some cannot deal with the anxiety of not being able to return home soon
International travel curbs and border restrictions to stem the spread of the coronavirus have resulted in cruise ships being turned away each day by ports around the world. The downturn in air travel due to the pandemic, leading to difficulties in cruise operators chartering flights home for their employees, is part of the reason tens of thousands of crew members are effectively stranded at sea.
Cruise workers are among the hundreds of thousands of weary seafarers stuck on ships, some for 15 months, United Nations shipping chief Kitack Lim said earlier this week.
Coco is particularly worried as food and medical supplies – such as vegetables, fruits and masks – have run low, and there are a handful of crew on board who have possibly caught the deadly coronavirus and are isolated in their rooms.
“There are many of us out at sea for months and some cannot deal with the anxiety of not being able to return home soon,” she said. “I hope this depressing tragedy does not go on.”
Stewart Chiron, a Miami-based independent cruise-industry analyst, estimates that close to 35,000 crew members, including Chinese nationals, are still stranded on the high seas, though the number has fallen sharply from about 60,000 last week.
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Many of the giant cruise liners have reported that Chinese citizens are among crew who have yet to return home, and it might be some time before they can do so as the Chinese government is intent on preventing a possible new wave of infections from reaching its shores. A partial lockdown of Beijing was announced this week after a new cluster of Covid-19 cases tied to a seafood market was reported.
