Stranded

As reported by Stuff, members of the travelling contingent from Cook Islands, Samoa and Tonga - whose National Olympic Committees (NOCs) are all part of the Oceania National Olympic Committees (ONOC) - quarantined for 14 days as they returned from the Games to New Zealand.

The athletes were unable to fly directly to or from the Japanese capital, having to transit in New Zealand at the expense of their NOCs.

This has been a great success, with people from many Rotary clubs throughout Christchurch donating.

While some of the team managed to clear Auckland and return to Tonga before the lockdown four of the team were unable to leave because of the lockdown.

They must now wait to return home until flights resume, hopefully on the next repatriation flight on 20 October.

This has left them in a very difficult situation with them totally dependent on the generosity of their friends to help provide their accommodation and living costs.

The Tongan nationals claimed their government had turned a blind eye to their pleas to return home after it allowed 14 Chinese into the Kingdom late last month to work on a government project.

In a joint statement, the agitated travellers and seafarers claimed Tonga underestimated Fiji’s health system, assuming that they could get the COVID-19 virus into the country, the Fiji Times reports.

“Tonga trusts China, the place where COVID- 19 originated,” the statement read.

A third man, who was in the boat when it left Marshall Islands on 2 April, reportedly jumped into the sea 17 days into the 42-day open ocean drift.

Earlier this week, the Micronesian government's patrol vessel transported the two men from isolated Namoluk Atoll to Weno for medical check ups.

The two, Godfrey Capelle and Benjamin Thomas, washed up at Namoluk on 14 May, 42 days after their 20-foot outboard engine boat washed out of Kwajalein Atoll to begin its westward drift.