The KL592 flight from South Africa to Amsterdam had all of the trappings of international travel, from the food to the people.
Check-in agents had to sift through a lot of requirements to find out if a person was eligible to fly. Travelers in the United States were required to show a negative test result. Others did not. Some passengers wore masks on the long flight, but flight attendants often let the masks slide.
The passengers were on the flight, and they slept or watched their screens, but on the ground everything changed.
The Omicron variant was discovered in southern Africa and caused countries to close their borders. The arrivals descended into a new reality, with hours spent breathing stagnant air as their planes sat on the tarmac, then fighting exhaustion in crammed waiting rooms, waiting for test results to show if they had been exposed to a disease.
One passenger, a laboratory technician named Jan Mezek, 39, who was returning from a two-week work trip to his home in the Czech Republic, said that they were in the same room. He said that he felt like a pig in a pen and that they were spreading the virus around us.
Dutch officials say at least 14 people on that flight and another from South Africa had Omicron. Hundreds of people who showed negative results from the test that was administered at the airport were required to go home or board connecting flights to their final destinations after the Dutch authorities arrested a couple who tried to break out and fly to Spain.
They traveled around the world, who knows where, said a prominent Italian virologist. The passengers should have been isolated and monitored for seven to 10 days because they could have caught the virus on the flight and tested negative.
If this variant is very contagious, this flight is an explosion.
The flights have caused fears of superspreader events and raised concerns about lessons being unlearned. They are also indicative of the scattershot global response and the lack of enforcement that may lead to a more infectious stage of the Pandemic.
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More than 60 people were placed in a hotel near the airport after testing positive for the coronaviruses.
The Omicron variant is considered to be a very high risk by the World Health Organization. It will probably take weeks to know if it's an overblown scare or a new strain of vaccine-resistant disease that could cause a world-wide outbreak.
The United States opened its doors to European Union travelers and other nationalities earlier this month, allowing for hugs, tears and giddy reunions that had been denied to them in the past. European countries have different rules for testing and self-isolation for vaccine applicants than the United States. The patchwork of regulations was often shifting.
Karen A. Grépin, a professor at the School of Public Health at the University of Hong Kong, has been studying travel rules during the Pandemic. Transferring passengers sometimes have to meet different criteria because of the different testing requirements airlines have.
The passenger across the arm rest may have been tested differently than the passenger in the aisle seat. All inbound travelers are required to show proof of a negative test before boarding their flight.
The gate agent is usually responsible for navigating this warren of information, but who knows about dozens of different travel regulations on any given flight. The agents have been asked to fill the roles of border guards, health inspectors and consuls, which has caused tensions with passengers to get worse.
The good old days, when travel, if confusing, was possible, may soon seem like that.
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The departing travelers at Cape Town's international airport.
The United States and the European Union banned flights from southern Africa after the emergence of the Omicron variant. Israel and Morocco opened their doors to the world. Australia, Japan, and other countries were the first to delay opening up and joined China, which has a fortress mentality and is trying to eradicate the disease at home.
Positive cases of Omicron have already emerged in several countries, and public health experts consider its emergence inevitable.
An Italian who has not been publicly identified returned to Caserta in November after working in Mozambique. He said on Italian radio that he had tested negative and was on his way to Italy. He did not have to be sad upon his return since he was traveling for work.
He tested positive for the coronaviruses during a medical checkup in Milan, where he also underwent a Covid test to make sure he could return to Mozambique. He and his family are in isolation with light symptoms, all positive for the virus.
The airline apologized to passengers on Tuesday. The company was caught off guard by the variant, according to Marjan Rozemeijer.
She said that the company was asked by the Dutch government to park the aircrafts in a particular location so that all passengers could be tested.
The spokesman for the Dutch public health service said that it had gone above and beyond in its efforts, and that it had no reason to stop the passengers who had been tested negative for the virus.
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The passengers of the flight were at the Amsterdam Airport.
The Public Health Services of the Netherlands said there was no reason to stop people from traveling if they have a negative test. We don't know where the passengers went and we don't know why.
The Dutch health ministry said that even the passengers who tested negative should be in a hospital, and Mr. van den Oetelaar said that the agency had taken the extraordinary step of trying to contact everyone who was on the planes.
The World Health Organization said that international contact tracing was up to countries where cases were detected.
Mr. Mezek said he received a call from the Dutch public health service on Saturday and that he was told to stay home and give his travel details after leaving the Netherlands. The email was verified by the health agency and said that it was important to know where you were so that the health departments in different countries could contact you.
He should be tested for Covid five days after the South Africa-to-Amsterdam flight arrives. You could be infectious even if you don't have any symptoms.
Mr. Mezek said that he was in isolation and that the Czech authorities called him on Monday to make sure he was okay. He noted that if he had made his original connection a day earlier, he would be at work and at home with his family.
He said he wouldn't have been alone.
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The families are at the O.R. Tambo Airport.
The reporting was done by three people.
