Wow, that's insane! Was that all on one ticket (One World??). The Philippines now has a 4,000 entry cap a day (up from a previous 2,500) so it's probably that the final leg had capacity and therefore the rest was just positioning to that final leg.

They will now have to sit through some form of quarantine I think and hopefully be with their family for new year. Sadly they will most certainly miss Xmas in my estimation (which is more commonly celebrated on the 24th actually). But that said the COVID alert level here is fairly low so restrictions are somewhat minimalized (unlike Europe) so they might have a nice New Year gatherings. At least their journey will soon be at an end.