The primary plane carrying passengers from the hantavirus-hit cruise ship left Spain’s Canary Islands on Sunday for Madrid, where they can be taken to a military hospital.
Spanish nationals were the primary to depart the MV Hondius, which stays anchored off Tenerife, the most important island within the Spanish archipelago off West Africa’s coast. The ship arrived hours earlier.
Not one of the greater than 140 people on the Hondius has shown symptoms of the virus, Spain’s health ministry, the World Health Organization and cruise company Oceanwide Expeditions said.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus sought to reassure the general public, repeating on Sunday that the chance for most people from the outbreak remained low.
Even so, those disembarking and personnel working on the port of Granadilla in Tenerife wore protective gear throughout the evacuation process, including face masks, hazmat suits and respirators.
Spanish Health Minister Mónica García said that the operation was proceeding normally.
Passengers and a few crew members from greater than 20 nationalities on board can be evacuated throughout Sunday into Monday.
After reaching Madrid, those evacuated on the primary plane can be under quarantine, Spanish health authorities say. Only the 14 Spanish nationals on board will quarantine within the country.
Authorities have said the passengers and crew members disembarking can be checked for symptoms, don’t have any contact with the local population and can only be taken off the ship once evacuation flights are able to fly them to their destinations. Tedros and Spain’s health and interior ministers are supervising the operation in Tenerife.
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Pope Leo XIV on Sunday thanked the Canary Islands for allowing the arrival of the Hondius.
Hantavirus often spreads when people inhale contaminated residue of rodent droppings and isn’t easily transmitted between people. However the Andes virus detected within the cruise ship outbreak may have the opportunity to spread between people in rare cases. Symptoms often show between one and eight weeks after exposure.
Three people have died for the reason that outbreak, and five passengers who left the ship are infected with hantavirus, which may cause life-threatening illness.
Passengers and crew members disembarking are forsaking their luggage, and are allowed to take only a small bag with essential items, a cellphone, a charger, and documentation.
Some crew, in addition to the body of a passenger who died on board, will remain on the ship, which is able to sail on to Rotterdam, Netherlands, where it can undergo disinfection, Spanish authorities said.
The expected sailing time to Rotterdam is around five days, the cruise company said.
Evacuation and quarantine plans
The U.S., the UK and the Netherlands will send planes to evacuate their residents. Americans on board can be quarantined at a medical center in Nebraska.
Twenty-nine people can be on board the Dutch charter flight, including Dutch nationals and folks of other nationalities, the Dutch Foreign Ministry said.
Five French passengers can be repatriated Sunday, and can be hospitalized for 72 hours for monitoring, after which they may quarantine at home for 45 days, France’s Foreign Ministry said.
U.K. passengers and crew can be hospitalized for commentary once they’re flown home, British authorities say.
Australia is sending a plane, expected to reach on Monday, to evacuate its nationals and people from nearby countries resembling Recent Zealand, García said. Its plane can be the last to depart Tenerife, she said.
Norway has sent an ambulance plane to Tenerife with personnel trained to move patients with high-risk infections, its Directorate for Civil Protection told public broadcaster NRK.
The ambulance plane is owned by the European Union, but operated by Norway.
Countries monitor suspected cases
British Army medics have parachuted onto the distant South Atlantic territory of Tristan da Cunha, where certainly one of the 221 residents has a suspected case of hantavirus.
The patient was a passenger on the MV Hondius and disembarked last month.
The U.K. defense ministry says a team of six paratroopers and two medical clinicians jumped Saturday from a Royal Air Force transport plane, which also dropped oxygen and medical equipment.
Tristan da Cunha is Britain’s most distant inhabited overseas territory, about 1,500 miles (2,400 kilometres) from the closest inhabited island, St. Helena. The group of volcanic islands has no airstrip and is frequently accessible only by boat on a six-day voyage from Cape Town, South Africa.
Meanwhile, a Spanish woman within the southeastern province of Alicante suspected of being infected tested negative for hantavirus, Spanish health authorities said Saturday.
The lady was a passenger on the identical flight because the Dutch woman who died in Johannesburg after traveling on the cruise ship.
—Suman Naishadham reported from Madrid. Angela Charlton in Paris, Jill Lawless in London, and Kirsten Grieshaber in Berlin, contributed to this report.
© 2026 The Canadian Press