COVID-19 Diaries: How I Made It Out Of Hubei Just Hours Before The Lockdown

Dinosaur is a Hong Kong citizen with a mum from a small village inside the Hubei province of China. She and her family went back to Hubei before the Chinese Lunar New Year, only to find themselves fleeing 2 days later—just hours before Hubei went into formal lock down because of the COVID-19 outbreak. This is her story. 

Q: Hi Dinosaur, thanks for coming on to talk about your experience! When did you first hear about the 2019-nCoV / COVID-19 coronavirus and what did you think of it then?   

A: I knew there was such a virus in Dec 2019, it was called Wuhan Pneumonia at that time. I didn’t realise it would be that serious in January.

Why and when did you choose to go to Hubei? Which part did you go to? 

My mum is from Hubei so we went to Hubei for the Lunar New Year. Since the high-speed train ticket was sold out while the air ticket was too expensive, we decided to drive to Yichang, a city in Hubei province. We left Hong Kong on 22 Jan and arrived Yichang the next day, 23 Jan.

As I remember, the government announced on 22 Jan: “Wuhan (another city in Hubei) would be in lock down from 23 Jan, public transport would be unavailable in Hubei from 25 Jan”. If you guys decided to travel by plane instead of car, you guys might be trapped in Hubei, is that right? Which airport would it be if you chose to take a plane?

If we took the plane or high-speed rail we definitely would be trapped in there. I think I am so lucky this time. If we chose to take a plane, we would probably fly from Shenzhen to Yichang. The public transportation including train and plane were all unavailable in Hubei from 25 Jan.

When did you become more concerned about the virus?

I started to worry before the trip and I tried to ask my family not to go back [to Yichang]. However, they didn’t show much concern. Anyway, I went with them even though I was not willing to go. We arrived at Yichang on 23 Jan and [right away] heard that Wuhan would be lock down. I became more and more nervous on 24 Jan because there was rumour saying the whole Hubei would be in lockdown as well. My family members started to become a bit tense at this point.

What made you decide to leave Hubei? How many people in Hubei were infected and dead at that point? 

On 24 Jan, there was a rumour saying that the whole of Hubei would be in lock down the next day. However, we stayed on at our relative’s home because we were not sure if the rumour was true. We visited relatives in a village and prepared for the Lunar New Year. 

Suddenly, at 1am on 25 Jan, we received an urgent call from one of our relatives working for the government and were told that the rumour was true. He told us to leave as soon as possible at because the lock down would be effective from 6am, 25 Jan!!!

Understanding we were running out of time, my brother, dad and I packed luggage immediately. We were afraid there would be no more chance to leave if we didn’t go now. However, my mum decided to stay because she believed the village we stayed at was not located at the city centre, thus safe. 

At that time, there were about several hundred people [reportedly] infected, but my relatives were terrified because they believed the actual number would be much bigger than this. However, they were confident and believed the government would be able to solve the problem. Most of the people in Yichang were feeling doom and gloom with certain level of fear. However, nobody wore masks there.

How difficult was it to cross the border of Hubei? How did you make it? Did you face any trouble at any point for having come from Hubei?

We left immediately after receiving the phone call (around 1 a.m.). It was very tiring to drive past midnight but we were highly cautious. The weather was bad and visibility was quite low. Traffic was not heavy but obviously more than usual after midnight. I looked out of the window and realised there were cars from Wuhan (could be identified by car license plates) occasionally. The air was so cold on a Hubei winter morning, nobody spoke a word because of stress. It was so quiet that I could sense the smell of the dead. After 4 hours drive, we were less stressed because we crossed the Hubei border before the lock down. We were grateful for this but worried about mum on the contrary.

Immediately after entering Hunan, we were stopped by police on a highway, they asked us where we were from, we told them we drove from Hubei to here, but since our car license plate was a Hong Kong one, the police let us go after checking our body temperature. I realised that more and more people wore masks in other provinces. However, only very few people wore a mask when I was in Hubei.

I heard from the newspaper that some of the Wuhan people who escaped from home were later found astray outside because no hotel would accept them and the police might stop them. Why was it this easy for you to make it out?

I am not sure how they treated the cars with Wuhan license plates. Since we crossed the border before the Hubei lock down, our car could pass the checking points easily. (Hubei lock down was at 6am, 25 Jan, while Wuhan’s was at 10am, 23 Jan). Some cars next to us with Hubei license plates were stopped by police with more strict checking, but they were released if the police thought they met certain checking requirements.

More from others affected financially by COVID-19 coming next week. Follow the latest in our COVID-19 Diaries series here.

If you’re in a country that has been affected by the novel coronavirus and would like to share information about the situation where you’re at, do get in touch with us here.

Photographs courtesy and copyright of Dinosaur. Interviewer: Kauai
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