Wealthy turning to private jets to escape coronavirus outbreak

Big businesses and wealthy people are chartering private jets for “evacuation flights” out of countries hit by the coronavirus outbreak. Adam Twidell, the CE of the private jet booking service PrivateFly, said the company had been inundated with requests from multinational firms arranging the mass evacuation of staff from China and south-east Asia. Twidell said rich families were also chartering private jets to reduce the risk of exposing their families to the virus by avoiding commercial flights and busy airports. “Over the past few weeks, there’s undoubtedly been a rise in demand for short notice on-demand charter relating to the coronavirus Covid-19,” he said. “We’ve had a very significant number of inquiries for group evacuations and from corporates and individuals. Initially, inquiries were focused on evacuations from south-east Asia and other affected areas. But, increasingly, we are now seeing clients looking to take a private flight between a variety of global destinations, to avoid exposure to crowds in [commercial] cabins and airport terminals."<br/>