A married couple who tested positive for COVID-19 have been dragged off a plane and detained after they broke out of a hotel quarantine in the Netherlands. Amsterdam is on high alert after dozens of passengers tested positive for COVID-19 after arriving on two flights from South Africa last Friday—and 13 of them were infected with the heavily mutated Omicron variant. Reuters reports that the couple, reportedly a Spanish man and Portuguese woman, escaped their hotel quarantine and managed to get on a plane that was going to Spain, but they were caught right before takeoff. Dutch military police said in a statement that the pair was arrested “in an airplane that was about to depart” and have now been handed over to health authorities. It’s not clear whether the couple had tested positive for the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.
