Travellers, visitors rush to Australia amid coronavirus travel bans

Emotions are high at Brisbane airport today with final flights arriving and couples and families enjoying unexpected reunions before the closure of Australia’s borders in the midst of the coronavirus crisis.

BRISBANE Airport’s international arrivals lounge is in hysteria, as frantic visitors rush into Australia and travelling citizens flock home ahead of imminent border closures and airline groundings.

It was a scene of many emotions, with passengers crying, embracing and even sighing in relief.

‘We have to go now’: Frantic travellers flock to airport

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Landing in Brisbane this morning, French traveller Camille Bonillo was feeling “lucky” to arrive ahead of Australia’s planned border closure at 9pm tonight.

“I’ve got my boyfriend here, he’s French and I haven’t seen him in five months,” she said.

If Ms Bonilla hadn’t arrived before border closures, the couple would have faced an 11-month separation, with borders expected to close for at least six months.

Camille Bonilla at the Brisbane international airport after catching one of the last flights into Brisbane. AAP Image/Richard Gosling

“It was really important for me to come back … It’s worse in France,” she said.

“When I saw that the border was closing, I took the last flight, I quit my job.”

Ms Bonillo finished a shift yesterday at 10pm, booked a flight then scrambled to pack her belongings.

“It was stressful, I was worried the whole time at work that I might not make it … My flight was the last flight,” she said.

The journey to Australia wasn’t quite as joyous for Shannon McGuigan – who had been travelling Europe with his English girlfriend Chesca Knowles.

The couple were forced to cut their holiday short due to the effects of the pandemic.

“It just got super sketchy when we were walking around London,” Mr McGuigan said.

“Covent Garden … Everything that was normally buzzing those places were quiet, it was eerie. So we cut it short”.

The couple arrived home just in the nick time, with Ms Knowles (a UK citizen, in Australia on a student visa) avoiding border closures that could have kept the couple apart.

Shannon McGuigan had been travelling Europe with his English girlfriend Chesca Knowles. AAP Image/Richard Gosling

“I would have been sent back,” Ms Knowles said. “I was really torn because my family’s in the UK … and when you’re told you can’t travel for six months it hits hard.”

For Jacqui Knowles it was a sense of total relief as she welcomed son Sam home to Australia.

The 22-year-old had been working at Whistler, in Canada, when the ski slopes shut down leaving him without work in a foreign country.

“Sam suffers from asthma and with all of the updates every five minutes … I was worried,” Ms Norvill said.

“I’m so relieved as any Mum would be … to have him back.”

Jacqui Norvill (right) welcomes her son Sam home at the Brisbane International Airport. AAP Image/Richard Gosling

Meanwhile, the quiet departures lounge contained those foreign travellers making last ditch efforts to leave the country.

Natasha Ansiaux was rushing back to Belgium “worried” and “nervous” about the COVID-19 situation in Europe.

An uncharacteristically quiet scene at the Brisbane International Airport departure lounge. AAP Image/Richard Gosling

“It’s just a bad situation everywhere, it’s unbelievable,” she said.

“I was supposed to stay (in Australia) two or three weeks more.

“I had two days to say goodbye to everybody … my host family and everything, it was really hard. I think it’s safer in Australia right now, but for me, personally, I want to be with my family in my home.”