Julie Whitworth rushed from Manchester to Milan to Heathrow to board the repatriation flight
THE first Australians repatriated to the Northern Territory from overseas have completed their mandatory quarantine. One woman shares how overwhelmed she was to finally be back on Australian soil. READ HER STORY
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AS Julie Whitworth, Karen Buckingham and Rebecca Claire pulled up to Darwin Airport, they started clapping and jumping with excitement.
The trio met while in quarantine in Howard Springs, and were part of the first group of Australians to be repatriated from Heathrow in the UK to Darwin on October 22.
Ms Whitworth travelled to the UK earlier this year to spend time with her father who had stage four lung cancer. She missed his final moments but made it for the service.
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Afterwards every flight she tried to book to return to Australia kept getting cancelled.
Once she secured her seat on QF110 bound for Darwin, she was forced to make a stressful journey from her base in Manchester to Milan and then to Heathrow.
The second she settled in for the day-long flight however, she almost began crying.
“It was huge relief to know that it wasn’t a, ‘maybe you are going home’ it was an ‘I’m going home’,” she said.
“(Upon arrival) It was like, we’re on home soil and it was one single flight. There was no get off here, get your luggage, transit to there. It was just from London to Darwin, you’re on Australian soil and I was like, thank God.”
Ms Whitworth said despite being part of the “guinea pig” group for repatriation flights, her experience at Howard Springs was phenomenal.
“If you have to quarantine in Australia, that’s the place to go,” she said, before beginning her much-anticipated journey back to South Australia.
Karen Buckingham got stuck in the UK after she travelled there to look after her mum.
It’s been five months since she’s seen her husband, who jetted back to Australia when COVID-19 began to boom.
“I really thought I would never get back,” she said.
“A lot of Australians have no idea that it’s so hard to get back. The people who are stranded, they’re not stranded because they are arrogant or they’re ignorant.
“They’re stranded because they have genuine reasons for being there, and they belong in Australia. They need to be given the chance to go home. We don’t really appreciate how hard it is.”
She planned her first words to her husband to be “I love you”, before they make their way back to Cairns.
Rebecca Claire, also headed for Queensland, was itching to see her sons and dog.
She was living in the UK temporarily, and after she lost her job struggled to find a flight home.
“I said to my boys when I left, I’m only about 24 hours away,” she said.
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“Twenty-four hours and I’m home, if you need me. And when you take that freedom away, you just panic.”
Ms Claire said she was overwhelmed by the compassion of airport and Qantas staff, and said she broke down when I still call Australia home played on the flight.
The trio thanked Territorians for their kindness and hospitality.
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