Packed Qantas flight sparks outrage for ignoring social distancing

While the country practises social distancing in a bid to combat COVID-19, passengers on-board a Qantas flight have questioned why the rule doesn’t apply on planes.

While most of the world practises social-distancing measures to curb the spread of COVID-19, airlines have faced significant challenges abiding by the rules because of confined cabin spaces.

While some airlines have introduced measures to comply with social distancing, such as blocking the purchase of the middle seat to promote a “safer flying experience”, others are yet to introduce such measures.

One Twitter user shared a photo of a Qantas flight packed with passengers and questioned how a flight was able to travel with so many people on-board.

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This is a on a flight from Nth Qld to Bris today for work.
What kind of social distancing is this? Pls RT. #covid19australia@Qantas @AnnastaciaMP @MadFckingWitch @vanOnselenP @abcnews @ScottMorrisonMP pic.twitter.com/dAs9TNjPXf

— 😷🐨💧Greenmitty🌳 (@greenmitty) April 13, 2020

According to the man, the Qantas flight was from Townsville in far north Queensland to Brisbane on Monday afternoon.

“This is a on a flight from North Queensland to Brisbane today for work. What kind of social distancing is this?’ the passenger captioned the photo.

In the image, almost every seat is filled and very few passengers are wearing a face mask.

“How ON EARTH can it be acceptable that airlines aren’t required to leave the middle row vacant,” one person commented on the image.

“This is bad, when the rest of the country are isolating,” another added.

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Here is the boarding pass dated yesterday. The flight pic is genuine. If anyone can tell me how to display a date on a pic that's already been taken, let me know. @QANTAS #SocialDistancing #COVID19 pic.twitter.com/3gVfHxA7Ia

— 😷🐨💧Greenmitty🌳 (@greenmitty) April 14, 2020

In a statement sent to news.com.au, a Qantas spokesperson said most flights had only been around 30 per cent full – however, passenger numbers increased over the Easter weekend.

“The average load factors on our aircraft have been very low, with most flights around 30 per cent full, so social distancing has been happening by default,” the statement read.

“The weekend saw some flights that were much busier, which was the case on this particular flight. As a result, we have introduced formal social distancing. This means customers will be seated at the window or aisle with the middle seat remaining vacant.

“It’s important to note that there has been no known case of people contracting coronavirus on-board an aircraft anywhere in the world. This includes instances where a passenger has later turned out to have travelled while infected.”

Qantas says flights have normally been filled to 30 per cent due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Aviation around the world has been one of the hardest-hit industries amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Both Qantas and Virgin Australia have copped a battering from coronavirus and the related travel restrictions. Between then, both airlines have been forced to stand downs thousands of employees and are now only offering a handful of flights.

On Monday, it was announced both airlines were closing in on a multimillion-dollar deal with the Federal Government to support flights between capital cities; however, there are fears Virgin could soon go into administration.

The company has again been placed in a trading halt ahead of an announcement to the Australian Stock Exchange on Tuesday afternoon.