Voyage Timeline: Ushuaia to Cape Verde, Day by Day

This is the working chronology of the MV Hondius voyage of 1 April – 15 May 2026, reconstructed from Oceanwide Expeditions' published itinerary, AIS position data (MarineTraffic, vesselfinder.com), port-state records from Argentina, the United Kingdom (Saint Helena), Namibia, and Cabo Verde, the WHO Disease Outbreak News notice of 5 May 2026, the ECDC Rapid Risk Assessment of 7 May 2026, and verified first-hand accounts from twelve passengers and four crew members.

All times UTC unless otherwise noted. Entries marked [disputed] indicate a discrepancy between sources; we publish both versions rather than choose. The change log at the bottom of this article tracks every revision.

At a glance

• Vessel: MV Hondius — Dutch-flagged, IMO 9822030, ice-strengthened polar expedition vessel, built 2019 (Brodosplit, Croatia), operated by Oceanwide Expeditions B.V. (Vlissingen, NL).
• Souls on board at departure: 150 — 89 passengers (12 nationalities), 61 crew and expedition staff.
• Itinerary as sold: "South Atlantic Odyssey — Ushuaia to Cabo Verde via Falklands, South Georgia, Tristan da Cunha, Saint Helena, Ascension, Cape Verde", 45 days.
• Status as of 9 May 2026: Anchored 4.2 nm SSW of Praia, Santiago Island, Cabo Verde. Entry refused by the Cabo Verdean Ministry of Health. Medical evacuations by tender and Cabo Verdean Coast Guard helicopter ongoing.
• Deaths: 3 confirmed (1 passenger, 2 crew). Confirmed cases: 9. Probable: 14. Disembarked contacts under tracing: 23 across 5 countries.

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Phase 1 — Embarkation and the Beagle Channel (Days 1–3)

Day 1 — Wednesday, 1 April 2026 · Ushuaia, Argentina

• 15:30 ART (18:30 UTC) — Final passengers boarded at Muelle Comercial, Ushuaia. Argentine Naval Prefecture (PNA) cleared the vessel at 17:10 ART. Manifest: 89 passengers, 61 crew. No symptomatic individuals reported on the pre-boarding health questionnaire.
• 18:45 ART — Lines cast off. AIS first reported the Hondius underway at 21:51 UTC, heading 095° at 11.8 kn through the Beagle Channel.
• Pre-departure shore programme (28 March – 1 April): twenty-seven passengers participated in optional excursions to Tierra del Fuego National Park, the Lapataia Bay trails, and the Estancia Harberton sheep station. Investigators have flagged this window as the leading hypothesis for index exposure (see Shore Excursions Under Scrutiny).

Day 2 — Thursday, 2 April 2026 · East of Isla de los Estados

• Daylight transit past Isla de los Estados. Sea state 4, wind WSW 22 kn.
• 11:00 — First mandatory expedition briefing in the lecture theatre. All 89 passengers and 38 expedition/hotel staff attended; the room (capacity 110) was at full occupancy for ~70 minutes. Air-handling note: the Hondius uses a 100% fresh-air HVAC system on public spaces — this becomes relevant in ECDC's later assessment.

Day 3 — Friday, 3 April 2026 · Drake Passage approach, then NE diversion

• Original itinerary called for a south-easterly leg toward South Georgia. Captain T. van der Meer logged a routing change at 04:12 UTC after a low-pressure system south of the Falklands deepened to 968 hPa: vessel diverted NE toward Stanley for shelter.
• No symptomatic illness reported. Bridge log notes "all well" at the 20:00 UTC watch handover.

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Phase 2 — Falkland Islands (Days 4–7)

Day 4 — Saturday, 4 April 2026 · Stanley, Falkland Islands (FK)

• 09:40 FKT (12:40 UTC) — Anchored in Stanley Harbour. Falkland Islands Government (FIG) Customs and Immigration cleared the vessel for shore landings.
• 71 of 89 passengers went ashore. Excursion options: Gypsy Cove (Magellanic penguin colony), Stanley town walk, Volunteer Point (4WD, full day, 14 passengers).
• No rodent contact reported in any passenger debrief.

Days 5–6 — 5–6 April 2026 · West Falkland landings

• Zodiac landings at Carcass Island (5 April) and Saunders Island / The Neck (6 April). Wildlife logs note albatross, rockhopper colonies, no notable mammalian fauna.
• First medical-log entry of interest: 6 April, 22:14 UTC — one passenger (M, 67, Dutch) presented with fever 38.4 °C, myalgia, dry cough. Treated symptomatically; provisional working diagnosis "viral URI". This is Patient A in the eventual case series.

Day 7 — Tuesday, 7 April 2026 · Departed Falklands, ENE for South Georgia

• 07:30 — Anchor up. Course 075°, speed 12.0 kn. Patient A confined to cabin 312, asymptomatic family contact (spouse) co-quarantined.

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Phase 3 — South Georgia (Days 8–13)

Day 8 — Wednesday, 8 April 2026 · At sea

• Patient A's fever broke overnight. Reclassified "improving" in the ship's medical log at 09:00. In retrospect, this matches the biphasic ANDV course — febrile prodrome, brief defervescence, then cardiopulmonary phase.

Day 9 — Thursday, 9 April 2026 · Grytviken, South Georgia (GS)

• Anchored Cumberland East Bay 11:20 UTC. Government Officer (GSGSSI) boarded; biosecurity inspection passed.
• Landings at Grytviken (whaling station museum, Shackleton's grave) and afternoon ship-cruise of Drygalski Fjord.

Day 10 — Friday, 10 April 2026 · Salisbury Plain & Prion Island

• King penguin landing at Salisbury Plain (am), Prion Island wandering-albatross walk (pm, 30 passengers, capped by GSGSSI permit).

Day 11 — Saturday, 11 April 2026 · Gold Harbour & St. Andrews Bay

• Two zodiac landings completed before weather closure at 16:00. Wind gusted to 48 kn at anchor; landings cancelled for the evening.
• 22:50 UTC — Patient A acutely deteriorated: SpO₂ 86% on room air, bilateral crackles on auscultation, BP 92/54. Started supplemental O₂ at 6 L/min via mask; vessel's two-bed medical suite activated.

Day 12 — Sunday, 12 April 2026 · Departed South Georgia, NE for Tristan

• 03:18 UTC — Captain decided to depart South Georgia early to shorten transit time to a port with shoreside critical care.
• 18:45 UTC — Patient A died in the ship's medical bay, three hours after intubation by the on-board physician (Dr. R. Lindqvist, Swedish-licensed). Provisional cause noted as "acute respiratory distress, pulmonary oedema, sepsis ?source". The body was placed in the vessel's refrigerated mortuary unit (capacity: 2).
• 20:30 UTC — Captain notified Oceanwide Marine Operations in Vlissingen and the Dutch flag-state administration (Inspectie Leefomgeving en Transport, ILT). Routine death-at-sea protocol initiated; the case was not yet flagged as an outbreak signal.

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Phase 4 — South Atlantic transit and Tristan da Cunha (Days 13–18)

Days 13–15 — 13–15 April 2026 · Open ocean

• 1,400 nm transit toward Tristan da Cunha. No landings. Three new febrile illnesses logged in the medical book: 13 April (F, 71, German), 14 April (M, 58, US), 15 April (M, 34, Argentine — crew, galley).
• 15 April, 14:00 UTC — Ship's physician requested telemedicine consultation with Oceanwide's contracted shoreside provider (Marine Medical, UK). Working differential: viral pneumonia cluster vs. atypical bacterial.

Day 16 — Friday, 17 April 2026 · Edinburgh of the Seven Seas, Tristan da Cunha (SH)

• Tendered passengers ashore (45 of 87 remaining mobile passengers). Tristan administrator (UK Overseas Territory) granted limited landing.
• Two crew remained off-duty in cabins; one passenger (the German woman) was now on supplemental oxygen in the medical suite.

Days 17–18 — 18–19 April 2026 · NNE for Saint Helena

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Phase 5 — Saint Helena: the first off-loading (Days 19–22)

Day 19 — Monday, 20 April 2026 · Jamestown, Saint Helena (SH)

• 08:10 UTC — Anchored Jamestown roads. Saint Helena Government Health Directorate boarded for routine medical clearance. Captain disclosed the death of Patient A and the cluster of febrile illness.
• Saint Helena's response: The Directorate authorised the disembarkation of the deceased's remains (repatriation via the RMS St Helena II charter to Cape Town) and the disembarkation of seven passengers who had completed their planned Saint Helena leg of the cruise.
• The seven who disembarked here are the first cohort of "lost contacts" — they boarded the weekly LIAT-Helena flight to Johannesburg on 23 April, before the cluster was recognised as a notifiable disease event. Five of the seven have since been located by national contact tracing; two remain unaccounted for as of 9 May.

Days 20–22 — 21–23 April 2026 · Saint Helena landings

• Tours to Longwood House (Napoleon's exile residence), Plantation House, Diana's Peak. Rodent-contact questionnaires later administered to passengers identify no shore exposure at Saint Helena considered plausible for ANDV (the only hantavirus-competent rodent species, Oligoryzomys longicaudatus, is endemic to the southern Andes — not Saint Helena).

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Phase 6 — Walvis Bay diversion (Days 23–27)

Day 23 — Friday, 24 April 2026 · Departed Saint Helena, ESE for Walvis Bay

• Itinerary diverted. Original plan called for a NNE leg to Ascension. Captain elected to divert ESE to Walvis Bay, Namibia — a port with a Level-3 hospital (Welwitschia Hospital), in consultation with Marine Medical UK and Oceanwide HQ.

Day 26 — Monday, 27 April 2026 · Walvis Bay, Namibia (NA)

• 04:50 UTC — Anchored outside Walvis Bay pending Namibian Ministry of Health and Social Services (MoHSS) clearance.
• 11:30 UTC — Boarded by MoHSS port-health team. The team applied the IHR (2005) protocol for an "event of potential international concern".
• Outcome: Namibia authorised the medical evacuation of four critically ill individuals (two passengers, two crew) to Welwitschia Hospital, but refused general disembarkation pending laboratory diagnosis.
• Sixteen additional passengers whose planned itinerary ended at Walvis Bay disembarked under a 14-day public-health observation order. One of these later tested positive in Windhoek on 2 May — the first laboratory-confirmed ANDV case linked to the voyage.

Day 27 — Tuesday, 28 April 2026 · Departed Walvis Bay, NW for Ascension

• 09:15 UTC — Hondius weighed anchor with 65 passengers and 59 crew remaining (124 souls).
• The Walvis Bay samples (serum, throat swabs, post-mortem lung tissue from Patient A, repatriated from Cape Town under cold chain) were flown by South African Airways cargo to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) in Johannesburg.

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Phase 7 — The diagnosis (Days 28–32)

Day 28 — Wednesday, 29 April 2026 · At sea

• Two further crew members symptomatic. Total active cases on board: 6 (4 passengers, 2 crew). Two on supplemental O₂.

Day 30 — Friday, 1 May 2026 · NICD Johannesburg

• NICD reported a positive RT-PCR for hantavirus genus on three samples, with sequence consistency to Andes orthohantavirus (ANDV) lineage SOUT confirmed by partial S-segment sequencing. Notification cascade initiated:
  • NICD → South African National Department of Health → WHO AFRO
  • In parallel: Namibian MoHSS → WHO AFRO
  • WHO AFRO → WHO HQ Geneva
• 17:40 UTC — WHO HQ formally notified Oceanwide Expeditions and the Dutch flag-state administration. The Dutch RIVM was looped in as the flag-state public-health authority.

Day 31 — Saturday, 2 May 2026 · Ascension Island denial of entry

• Hondius arrived in the Ascension roads at 06:20 UTC and requested anchorage. Ascension authorities (UK) refused entry citing the absence of suitable medical-isolation infrastructure. Vessel was instructed to proceed to Praia, Cabo Verde.

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Phase 8 — The Cape Verde standoff (Days 32–45)

Day 32 — Sunday, 3 May 2026 · NNE under WHO advisory

• Course set 010°, speed 11 kn. Estimated arrival Praia: 7 May.
• WHO Disease Outbreak News drafted. Oceanwide issued its first public statement at 19:00 UTC ("a cluster of respiratory illness aboard our vessel; we are working with international authorities").

Day 35 — Wednesday, 6 May 2026 · WHO DON published

• WHO published Disease Outbreak News: Andes virus disease — multi-country (ex-cruise vessel) at 12:00 UTC. The notice listed 8 confirmed and 11 probable cases, 3 deaths, and contact tracing across 5 countries.

Day 36 — Thursday, 7 May 2026 · ECDC Rapid Risk Assessment

• ECDC published its RRA: risk to the general EU/EEA population assessed as very low; risk to disembarked contacts and on-board population high. The document specifically noted the Hondius's 100% fresh-air HVAC and absence of recirculated cabin air as a mitigating factor against airborne intra-cabin spread.

Day 37 — Friday, 8 May 2026 · Arrival off Praia, Cabo Verde

• 04:55 UTC — Hondius arrived in the Praia roads. Cabo Verdean Ministry of Health (Ministério da Saúde) formally refused entry at 09:30 UTC, citing the IHR Article 28 sovereign right to deny pratique on public-health grounds.
• Helicopter medevac authorised. The Cabo Verdean Coast Guard (Guarda Costeira) deployed an AW139 to evacuate the two most critical patients (one crew member, one passenger) to Hospital Dr. Agostinho Neto in Praia for ICU care under strict isolation.
• 22:00 UTC — second death: the Argentine galley crew member (M, 34) died on board despite escalation to ventilation. Body transferred to the refrigerated mortuary unit alongside the post-mortem container of Patient A's tissue samples (already shipped onward; container empty and decontaminated).

Day 38 — Saturday, 9 May 2026 (today)

• 05:15 UTC — Third death confirmed: a 71-year-old German passenger (Patient B from Day 13's medical log) at Hospital Dr. Agostinho Neto, Praia, ~37 hours after evacuation.
• Hondius remains at anchor, 4.2 nm SSW of Praia. 122 souls on board (62 passengers, 60 crew). Two further patients on supplemental oxygen; both clinically stable.
• Cabo Verdean authorities, Oceanwide, the Dutch flag state, and WHO are negotiating a controlled disembarkation framework — a "managed pratique" under a quarantine order at a designated cordoned area near Porto da Praia.
• Days 39–45 (10–16 May 2026) are anticipated to follow this controlled-disembarkation timeline; this section will be updated in real time.

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Souls on board — running total

Date	On board	Disembarked this leg	Cumulative disembarked
1 Apr (Ushuaia, depart)	150	—	0
20 Apr (Saint Helena)	143	7 (passengers) + 1 (deceased)	8
27 Apr (Walvis Bay)	124	16 (pax) + 4 (medevac)	28
8 May (Praia, anchor)	122	2 (medevac)	30
9 May (current)	122	—	30

Of the 30 who left the ship before 9 May: 23 remain under active contact-tracing (passengers and one disembarked crew galley relief). 4 are hospitalised. 3 are deceased. Two (Saint Helena cohort) remain unaccounted for as of 9 May.

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Sources

• Oceanwide Expeditions B.V. — voyage manifest, public statements 3, 5, 7, 8 May 2026.
• AIS positional data — MarineTraffic, vesselfinder.com (callsign PJST, MMSI 244660782).
• Falkland Islands Government Customs & Immigration — port arrival record, 4 April 2026.
• Government of South Georgia & the South Sandwich Islands — visitor permit log, 9–11 April 2026.
• Saint Helena Government Health Directorate — port-health record, 20 April 2026.
• Namibian Ministry of Health and Social Services — IHR notification, 27 April 2026 (referenced in WHO DON).
• WHO Disease Outbreak News — Andes virus disease — multi-country (ex-cruise vessel), 6 May 2026.
• ECDC — Rapid Risk Assessment: Andes virus disease associated with cruise vessel MV Hondius, 7 May 2026.
• Cabo Verde Ministério da Saúde — public communiqué, 8 May 2026.
• NICD South Africa — laboratory bulletin, 1 May 2026.
• Twelve passenger interviews (recorded; transcripts on file). Four crew interviews (anonymised at request).

Change log

• 2026-05-09 07:00 UTC — Initial publication. Day-by-day chronology through 9 May.
• Future revisions will be appended here with timestamps. Where a previously published fact is corrected, the original wording will remain in strikethrough and the correction added inline.