Who is flying/catching planes at the moment?

[OFAHmusical]

I’m just curious (and I’ve tried Googling but the only articles I can find are from last year).

I can think of very few reasons why someone would fly in or out of the UK right now. Business travel is surely stopped for now. Holidays aren’t happening - even if someone came here for a holiday, everything is shut. Of course some people will need to rush to see parents who are elderly, possibly dying etc but there can’t be that many of those.

I totally support the government’s plan to quarantine people who fly in ... I’m just wondering who they are?!

DH builds wind farms so travels wherever the project is

[quote OFAHmusical]@EileenGC I work in theatre - I totally understand about having no work and needing to go where the work is. Unfortunately I work in the West End, which is of course closed, and no one’s inviting me for gigs abroad. I didn’t even know that sort of work was possible at the moment![/quote]
It's devastating to see how music and theatre are literally dying in the UK... it makes me so sad. There is no investment and no protection for those who live off theatre. I have many colleagues in the West End and it's horrible seeing how everything has stopped indefinitely.

I'm lucky to be in a country (Germany) where live music is still going on, albeit without an audience right now as we're in a lockdown. But we're all working as usual - at the risk of outing myself, I will say I'm currently preparing tomorrow's run where there will be 80 of us on stage at the same time. We can do it because the government funds it all. We rehearse, perform, record, live stream, teach and receive tuition in person, there is a lot of music going on. Oh, and we also swab our throats a lot

Colleagues of mine are currently in France, Netherlands, Estonia, Denmark, all working. I was in Spain over Christmas and watched several live concerts with real audiences, one of them was a 60-piece choir performing for 2h with masks on. It was impressive to say the least.

Hang in there, it will all get better. Who knows when... but it will. I think Central Europe is much more connected internationally in terms of gigs so we've simply maintained our pre-Covid connections. West End works differently, I have a friend whose wife wants to move abroad and he's banned it because in his words, there is only one West End in the world! If only Boris realised that...

@MaxNormal

Elite sports exemptions, too, though they go charter, straight to hotel if it’s an overnight, straight to training, game, and straight back to airport. Strict testing regime for everyone in the team bubble.

DH has mostly been flown commercial although obviously needing a negative test within 72 hours of boarding. Only one job where they had a private flight.
It also depends where they go as to how strict things are in the local area. Where he is just now it's strictly hotel and site, but a prior job in Dubai they could move around at will.

DH's lot are sticking to their own strict rules as set down by the government and the national sports body to merit the elite sports exemption, regardless of where they are travelling to and local rules there.

It makes no sense to be guided by more permissive local rules at a specific destination, as what they're guarding against is getting infected and then spreading it at home among the team and/or their families, not to mention forfeiting games if significant numbers of the squad are positive -- and obviously there's an inevitable infection risk from the opposition in a team sport, anyway, even if they're obeying the same protocols, so you want to keep away from any other avoidable sources!

@EileenGC

Well it’s good to know that outside of this island things are carrying on! Brexit seems to have thrown a spanner in the works as far as European touring goes, but it’s good to know there’s still work out there.

Bailegangaire DH abides by whatever rules his client sets, he has no wish to pusd them off right now as he feels lucky to be working.

I should add, he's not working on any team sports.

@GCAcademic

As someone has said above, university students. I have one who is missing my seminar today because she's going to be on a plane. I have no idea why, all the teaching is online and she actually chose to go home to her European country during the November lockdown.

A friend's daughter has just flown back to the UK to go back to university. She wants to live with her friends in the house she's paying for, not in her parents' house having to cope with two loud sisters, slow wifi and feet of snow.