Authorities prepare for arrival of MV Hondius in Canary Islands
After three passengers suspected to have hantavirus were evacuated from the vessel in Cape Verde on Tuesday, the cruise ship has continued on its scheduled journey to the Canary Islands.
The Spanish archipelago, which sits 60 miles off the coast of Morocco, is set to receive all remaining passengers and crew onboard the MV Hondius on Sunday.
“They will arrive at a completely isolated, cordoned-off area,” said Spain’s head of emergency services Virginia Barcones on Thursday. “They will board vehicles that are isolated and under guard, and will proceed to a section of the airport that will be completely cordoned off.”
Barcones clarified the procedure so that residents of the Canary Islands “can rest assured that there will be absolutely no possibility of contact” with passengers from the cruise ship.
The scheduled arrival of the MV Hondius in Tenerife this Sunday comes despite pushback from the islands’ president, Fernando Clavijo. On Tuesday, Clavijo said that he “cannot allow” passengers to disembark on the islands, which he claimed would “blindly endanger the safety of the Canary Islands population.”
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