Covid-19: Travel scares in two capitals result in nervous wait for hundreds

More than 500 people in Melbourne and Brisbane face an anxious wait to determine their COVID-19 status after separate travel-related incidents.

A Qantas jet at Brisbane airport. Picture: Liam Kidston.

More than 500 people in Melbourne and Brisbane face an anxious wait to determine their COVID-19 status after separate travel-related incidents.

In Melbourne, 246 people have been told to urgently undertake a coronavirus test after a sudden surge in viral fragments in wastewater in the city’s western and northwestern suburbs.

“This additional action is being taken due to the strength of the wastewater detection and because a known positive COVID-19 case, from Flight QF778, has been in Victoria in the past 14 days,” Victoria’s Chief Health Officer, Brett Sutton, said.

“The 246 people who have been contacted today include four primary close contacts of that case and 242 recently returned red and orange zone travel permit holders.

“All of these primary close contacts have recently been tested and have returned negative results. All of the 246 people are being asked to test again out of an abundance of caution.”

Melbourne now has a long list of suburbs named as potential exposure sites with fragments detected in four additional catchments in Melbourne’s western, northern, northwestern, and outer eastern suburbs.

“It is most likely that these new detections are due to a person or persons continuing to shed the virus after the infection period; however, it could also be due to a person living in or travelling through the area in the early active infectious phase,” Professor Sutton said.

Meanwhile, human error has been blamed for a serious breach of Brisbane International Airport’s green zone — potentially putting more than 300 people at risk of COVID-19 infection.

Two “red zone” passengers from Papua New Guinea were incorrectly allowed into the green zone, which is restricted to trans-Tasman bubble travellers from New Zealand and Australia, Brisbane Airport Corporation said on Thursday.

The PNG passengers spent almost two hours in the green zone from 9.55am to 11.20am, visiting retailers and using the bathroom before airport staff found them.

For most of the time the passengers were seated at one retailer, the statement said.

Workers in the green zone were wearing personal protective equipment, and thorough cleaning had been carried out following the breach.

During the period in which the PNG travellers were in the green zone, 390 passengers boarded three flights to New Zealand, most of whom were wearing face masks.

“Only a handful of passengers were in the vicinity of the two red passengers at any time,” the BAC statement said.

“Brisbane Airport Corporation is conducting a thorough investigation and unreservedly apologises for this human error.

“Queensland Health is leading the health response to this incident and working with the New Zealand Ministry of Health.”

Papua New Guinea has been the single biggest source of hotel quarantine-detected COVID-19 cases in the past few months in Queensland.

The Australian understands both PNG passengers have been COVID-tested and one has been confirmed as negative but the other is inconclusive at this stage.