1Aturnleft

But as a British Citizen I can still transit Germany to fly to South Africa and return via the same route and all I need to fly is a negative PCR. I'm not banned outright from doing so. Is the non-shenghen area at FRA/MUC somehow Covid free? And yet by doing so I come into contact with with passengers from/to Germany, German airport staff and if travelling on Lufthansa German cabin crew. It makes absolutely no sense.... South Africa is Omricon dominant and yet the routes from/to Germany are wide open and nobody bats an eyelid. I get what you're saying but all things considered it would be easier to justify if Germany were banning ALL countries with high numbers of Omricon variant. They're not. This is probably moving further into Omni territory than I or a vigilant mod would appreciate so I'll stop here.

LCY8737

I don't think anybody believes this will stop omicron, the benefit is in delaying it. Much like the UK put most of Southern Africa on the red list and then removed it once omicron became dominant here. Will be interesting to see if Germany will extend the restrictions when they expire in early Jan.

And yes, agree, we are going a little off topic now.

Europeanexplorer

I’m flying JFK-LHR-DUS today and can report that everything is fine. I have my boarding passes etc and I would not have met the new rules for UK-Germany travel (which is tomorrow after the rules change).

HFHFFlyer

Two cancellations to BER today, BA8491 from LCY and BA986 from LHR.

Two other rotations for LHR and one from LCY appear to be operating.

No other cancelletions for later in the week but I suspect that will change during the course of today.

chris1979

my reading of EF status suggests the LHR rotation was cancelled for operational reasons whilst the LCY was cancelled due to COVID reasons.

LHR BA operations had a very challenging weekend - I believe on-time performance was single digit % yesterday. Lots of operations teams short-staffed due to staff being down with COVID.

So those cancellations may not be because of the restrictions but other issues / pressures.

squawk

As a German resident intending to visit the UK over the next couple of weeks, this is a pain in the neck.

As others have said, the classification as a 'virus variant area' means pre-departure PCR and mandatory 14 day quarantine on arrival for the vast majority of people with no chance of early release - not even a day 5 or 10 'negative PCR test to release'. You cannot circumvent these rules by going via a third country, because the Einreiseanmeldung (German equivalent of the Passenger Locator Form) explicitly asks for all places you have been in the last 10 days.

​​​​​
I understand why Germany has done this. Yes, in the medium/long term it is futile - Omicron is already here in Germany and undoubtedly spreading. But the case rates so far suggest it has not yet taken off/become dominant in the way it has in the UK. At a guess (and it is only that) I would Germany is somewhere between 1 and 3 weeks behind the UK. Having lots of seeding events at an early stage, especially as LCY8737 said upthread at a time when people are typically in very close family contact, is not desirable.

The other factor likely playing into this is that Germany has a lower proportion of vulnerable older people fully jabbed/boosted. The UK's vaccine rollout has been very successful in ensuring the oldest/most vulnerable age groups are as well protected as possible. The people who aren't fully vaccinated in the UK are (generally) in the younger age groups; in Germany they're more evenly spread out. I fear this will mean worse outcomes amongst these vulnerable groups when Omicron hits.

Delaying the brunt of Omicron, even by a couple of weeks, will permit more people to be vaccinated/boosted. Over the last few weeks, the number of jabs has been increasing significantly and in the 7 days vaccinations have been running at an average of 1million jabs per day. Of course, it will take time for these jabs to feed through into immunity, and the vaccination isn't 100% against catching/spreading it. But every little helps, and given the situation facing Germany and the dynamics of vaccine uptake, it is understandable to me that they've made this choice.

I had missed this, do you have the source of this information? Is it buried in the RKI thing somewhere? I certainly hope this is the case, it would make my life a lot simpler!

To try and drag this back onto BA...

Over the weekend BA already cancelled the late morning LHR-FRA in January, leaving an early morning or a latish evening rotation on the weekday that I was planning to travel. I agree that a skeleton service is likely even if restrictions continue, though FRA itself did lose all BA flights at various points in the last week (I was rebooked last November and again in April on LH).

mustafina

In a similar situation squawk and feel your pain.

At the top of the RKI listing it does say that the Virusvariantengebiet list is valid until 0:00 on 3.1.22. However, there's obviously no guarantee that it will change after that date and it specifically mentions that "an extension is possible". It does feel as though they are trying to keep the lid on things over Christmas and New Year.

On the BA topic, looks as though 2-3 flights per day are still scheduled between MUC and LHR, which is the post-Covid norm. How many will get cancelled is another question. I know a few German residents still planning to travel anyway and suck up the quarantine, so perhaps demand is holding up.

bpk6h

​​​​​​The current January 3rd expiry is here: https://www.rki.de/DE/Content/InfAZ/...biete_neu.html

Chiller3333

They have started zeroing out some of the flights to FRA (and I think CDG) between xmas and new year's.
The customer guidelines for rebooking onto LH have also been "updated" (althrough I don't see any change from the previous version).
Would expect cancellations to go out sometime this week.

PAL62V

Where did you see these? (for CDG)

Chiller3333

Expertflyer, on 2/27 and 12/28 BA304 and BA307 seem to be destined for the chopping block.

Europeanexplorer

As promised a little update on my JFK-LHR-DUS experience - in one word: chaotic. I had no problem with BA/VeriFLY and managed to get my boarding passes for both flights without issue at JFK.

However, when I got to DUS, things went awry. There was a general confusion about the rules given the recent changes and the immigration officers were unclear on whether: (i) non-German citizens/resident who transitted airside in LHR could enter the country at all and (ii) whether a covid arrival form (Einreiseanmeldung) was necessary for passengers from the US who had transitted airside in LHR.

On point (i), the non-German transit passengers had to wait for ages while the immigration officers clarified the rules with their superiors. I gather that they were eventually allowed to proceed after a significant amount of questioning and confusion. Hopefully this is just a day one teething problem.

On point (ii), the officers eventually decided that the online form was required afterall and I was asked to fill out a paper form at the airport. This is clearly wrong as the online form cannot be completed if you have not been to a high risk or virus mutation zone, so there is no way for someone coming from the US at the moment to fill this out.

The immigration officers did however agree that quarantine was not necessary after I pointed them to the relevant German Health Ministry FAQs - this was the key worry for me.

There have also been quite a few cancellations now (both LCY and LHR to both of FRA and DUS).

Chiller3333

Thanks for the update. I'm packing at the moment and will be making my way to JFK in a couple of hours.
This sounds crazy. Had no problem checking in online and have my BPs already.
Will be flying on to FRA form LHR and give an update on what the situation is like over there when I'm home.
I'll fill out the paper entry form just in case...

creflo

https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/c...627200021.html
If it helps, point to §6(1)No.1 and §2 No. 15 in the actual law. Could not be clearer that airport transits are only "transits" that do not trigger registration and quarantine requirements.

Chiller3333

Cheers mate!!!