The hantavirus-infected MV Hondius is estimated to arrive near the port of Granadilla, on the island of Tenerife, between 4 a.m. and 6 a.m. local time Sunday, Spain’s Health Minister said.
The vessel will not be allowed to dock in the Canary Islands when it approaches Sunday — and instead will be left floating just offshore, as hazmat-clad health teams swarm aboard to evaluate and evacuate the passengers and crew back to two dozen countries.
It comes after a dramatic week-long showdown between the conservative local leader and Spain’s socialist prime minister, over the decision to follow orders from the World Health Organization to let the cursed ship in.
Crew members of the MV Hondius wait to speak to epidemiologists. AP
The 147 passengers and 60 crew members will be transferred to the port, through a “completely isolated, cordoned-off area,” wearing full protective garb, and bussed to the airport, with evacuations to begin within 24 hours of the ship’s arrival.
The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, arrived on the Canary Islands Saturday to oversee the evacuation and attempted to reassure petrified locals.
The 14 Spanish nationals aboard will be the first evacuated and flown to a military hospital in Madrid to quarantine.
A team of epidemiologists and medical professionals deployed by the Centers for Disease Control will escort the 17 Americans on board the ship.
The agency alerted doctors in the United States to prepare for potential imported cases of the hantavirus linked to the rat virus-stricken cruise ship.
Medical workers awaited the passengers from the MV Hondius Friday. Anadolu via Getty Images
The 17 Americans will be taken to the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha to quarantine. University of Nebraska Medical Center
In an alert issued Saturday, the CDC warned early symptoms could mimic the flu and that testing should be repeated in the first 72 hours — while insisting the risk of broad spread to the US was still “extremely unlikely at this time.”
The US Department of State is chartering a government medical repatriation flight that will bring the 17 American passengers to the Air Force One Base in Omaha, Nebraska.
A microscopic image of liver tissue specimen taken from a hantavirus patient. US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)/AFP via Getty Images
After initially saying Friday they would be transported to the National Quarantine Center at the University of Nebraska, where another CDC team is being deployed, to isolate – a CDC official Saturday told ABC News “we are not quarantining anybody.”
The passengers will be evaluated upon arrival in Nebraska, but won’t be tested if they don’t show symptoms, the CDC official said.
Three people have died, including Dutch ornithologists Leo and Mirjam Schilperoord and a German passenger.
The stricken ship will not be allowed to dock when it arrives at the Canary Islands. REUTERS
The Schilperoords’ bodies have been repatriated to the Netherlands, but the German woman’s body remains on the ship, and will stay aboard with a handful of crew members after Sunday.
They will continue the voyage to the Netherlands, from where the body will be repatriated and the ship disinfected.
Five other cases have been confirmed by the WHO so far, with more suspected. The confirmed cases include three passengers airlifted from Cape Verde to the Netherlands on May 6, including 56-year-old British crew member Martin Antsee, who remain in the hospital as of Saturday.
Passengers embarked on the doomed cruise April 1.
Another was a 69-year-old British man, a passenger, who was airlifted from Ascension Island on April 27 to an intensive care unit in Johannesburg — along with his American partner, who is reportedly asymptomatic.
United Kingdom authorities confirmed Friday that a local on the remote island of Tristan da Cunha — where the ship made its first scheduled stop on April 15 — was being treated for a suspected case of the rodent-borne virus.
A passenger takes a photo of the empty deck on the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship on May 6, 2026. AP
Hantavirus – the disease that killed Gene Hackman’s wife Betsy Arakawa – is usually spread through rodent droppings, but this strain, the Andes virus, can be spread between people and carries a mortality rate of nearly 40%.
Argentina experienced a spike in cases last year, logging 86 infections and 28 deaths in 2025 — one of its deadliest tallies in years, with wildfires in Patagonia suspected of pushing rodents closer to towns.
A passenger gets some water from the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship. AP
In January, the country’s National Epidemiological Bulletin determined that “with a total of 58 confirmed cases, the country is at the outbreak threshold” for hantavirus.
Argentinian officials dispatched a team to the city of Ushuaia this week to capture and analyze rat samples for the virus.
Additional reporting by Adry Torres