More than 2,000 crew and passengers on the cruise liner Costa Fortuna (that arrived in Patong Bay Friday morning / March 6) were denied debarkation after officials confirmed that 64 Italians onboard had left Italy in the past 14 days.
Thailand's government on Thursday instituted a 14-day quarantine on all people arriving from Italy, Iran, South Korea, Hong Kong, Macao, and China.
The Costa Cruises' ship Fortuna arrived in Patong for a scheduled overnight carrying a total of 1631 passengers plus 984 crew. Of all the crew and passengers, 3 are Chinese, 2 Singaporeans, 151 French, 282 Italians, 230 Germans.
The decision to not allow any of them to disembark in Phuket follows confirmation that a total of 64 of the Italians on the liner are suspected of carrying Coronavirus (COVID-19).
Chanaphaikul said that while there were no confirmed cases of COVID-19 on the cruise ship, all people on board were a health risk and they had to remain in quarantine for 14 days. The ship had to remain about 2 nautical miles from shore.
He added that next, they would have to discuss what was to be done with other cruise ships scheduled to come to Phuket.
For other Costa Fortuna accidents and incidents see at the ship's CruiseMinus page.
For Coronavirus updates on cruise ship quarantines (infected passengers and crew) and top-pandemic countries (COVID-19 cases and deaths, daily updated statistics) see at CruiseMapper's Norovirus page.