Couple At Sea Finally Realize COVID-19 Is A Pandemic, ‘Ryan Read The News & Our Jaws Dropped’

The coronavirus has now reportedly infected around 2.6 million people in at least 185 countries and territories. The pandemic has put several countries to lockdown and disrupted the world economy. It’s been four months that the world is faced with the global health emergency, but this couple from Manchester, UK just came to know about the gravity of the situation.

According to BBC, Elena Manighetti and Ryan Osborne had set off on a voyage in their 11-metre sailing boat in February when COVID-19 had started spreading across the world. They were travelling across the Atlantic Ocean from the Canary Islands to the Caribbean.

The couple in their early thirties had quit their jobs in 2017 and bought a boat to sail around the world. Although they were frequently in contact with their families, they had one rule, no bad news, reports The Guardian.

“It’s quite a common thing for sailors not to want bad news when they are on an ocean crossing because there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. All you can do is cry, scream, worry, but you can’t turn around because the wind is behind you and is very strong,” said Elena.

Probably, that’s the reason they were unaware of the grim reality. When they left on their journey on 28 February, the last they had heard was that deaths from the virus were decreasing in number. But in mid-March, after 25 days at sea when they finally reached the Caribbean island, they discovered that the island had sealed its borders.

“We first attempted to land in one of the French territories in the Caribbean but when we arrived we found all the borders were closed and the islands were closing down.”

“Even at that point, we assumed it was a preventative measure due to the high season. We thought the islands didn’t want to run the risk of a few tourists infecting the locals,” Ryan said.

The couple then diverted to Grenada, where they finally managed to get some internet connection. “We bought some data and I remember Ryan reading out the news and our jaws just dropped,” said Elena. “It was hard to grasp the scale of it at first,” added Ryan.

“If you were waking up from a coma now, I think it would be hard to imagine the scale of what had unfolded.”

“In February we’d heard there was a virus in China, but with the limited information we had we figured by the time we got to the Caribbean in 25 days it would all be over,” said Elena. “When we arrived we realised it wasn’t over and the whole world had been infected,” added Ryan.

They then decided to head to Saint Vincent to a friend. “A friend of ours was already in Saint Vincent, which is where we were aiming to head. We managed to get in contact with her 10 hours before we were due to dock,” said Elena.

“She told us we were going to be refused entry as I’m an Italian citizen, even though I hadn’t been to Italy in months.”

However, since they have been tracking their journey via a GPS device, they were able to prove that they were living in isolation for the past one month, reports NDTV. They were finally allowed to dock in Bequia, an island in Saint Vincent where there were no confirmed cases of coronavirus at that time.

“It’s a very surreal experience landing in a place where everything feels almost normal, while the news tells you that the world is shut down. We’re torn between these two realities.”

“We are in this amazing place, we are super lucky and super grateful, while in the meantime people are dying and are in hospital,” said Elena.

However, they hope they’ll be allowed to leave before hurricane season begins. “We don’t want to leave Saint Vincent for now as nowhere is open. We are just going to sit tight. And hope that by the winter and the end of hurricane season, the borders will be back open and we can carry on exploring,” said Ryan.

We hope the situation gets back to normal soon and the couple is able to reach home safely like many other people stranded far off from their homes.