Airline employee on Delhi-Ludhiana flight tests COVID positive

LUDHIANA: A 50-year-old Alliance Air employee, one of the 11 people on board a Delhi-Ludhiana flight, has tested positive for coronavirus. All other passengers have been quarantined.

A total of 116 samples were taken on Monday when domestic flights restarted after two months of coronavirus lockdown. The test reports of 114 people were received, of which one was found positive, Ludhiana civil surgeon Dr Rajesh Bagga told NDTV.

The infected man is a resident of Delhi and works in the security department of Alliance Air. He was traveling on his own ticket and not on duty.

He was sent to a local isolation centre, while his co-passengers are on mandatory home quarantine.

A passenger on a Chennai-Coimbatore IndiGo flight has also tested positive for coronavirus. The company has grounded the entire crew for 14 days.

The centre last week allowed a third of domestic flights to operate from Monday. All international scheduled commercial passenger flights will remain suspended for now.

Several states had asked the centre to defer its decision to allow domestic flights amid rising coronavirus cases. Maharashtra okayed flights in worst-hit Mumbai hours after Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray said the state needed more time.

The Health Ministry, in its rules for domestic travel, has urged passengers to download the Aarogya Setu contact tracing app on their mobile devices and has asked states to ensure thermal screening at airports, railway stations and bus terminals. It has also made seven-day paid institutional quarantine mandatory for those returning from coronavirus hotspots.