Now Thailand has four Lockheed C-130 Hercules transport planes on standby to airlift its citizens from the city as the coronavirus outbreak spreads uncontrollably, reported the Bangkok Post.
Royal Thai Air Force Chief Maanat Wongwat told the Post that four C-130s, carrying medical teams, students, and medical professionals, are ready to take off from the Chinese city.
"The air force is ready" to evacuate its citizens, Wongwat said.
Evacuations from the city are already underway for the U.S., France, and Japan, as confirmed cases in China could exceed over 3,000 by the end of the weekend.
Thailand's evacuation plan also comes as a quarter-million people across China could be infected with the deadly disease in the next several weeks.
At the moment, four countries have initiated evacuation plans for their citizens trapped in Wuhan.
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A new report from The Wall Street Journal indicates the U.S. government is preparing an emergency charter flight to evacuate Americans from the epidemic-stricken Chinese city of Wuhan.
The operation comes after the death toll jumped 60% on Friday night to 41, with more than 1,400 confirmed infections.
China has restricted travel for 46 million people across 16 cities as the death toll surges, and the spread becomes uncontrollable.
New cases were also reported in Europe and Australia on Friday night.
In the U.S., there are 63 suspected cases, with at least three confirmed, with two reported so far in Illinois and California, and two suspected in Minnesota.
The Journal said about 1,000 Americans reside in Wuhan, but the official number has yet to be confirmed.
U.S. officials have contacted known Americans in the region with an offer for a seat on a Boeing 767 jet that holds approximately 230 people.
The Journal noted that medical personnel would be on the plane to examine passengers for potential cases of the deadly virus.
The emergency evacuation is planned for Sunday, but limited details were given on where the plane would land in the U.S.
A U.S. official told The Journal that additional emergency evacuation operations would be conducted in the coming days, which would include the bussing of Americans from the outbreak zone to other cities for outbound flights to the U.S.
Russia is also planning emergency evacuations of its citizens from Wuhan and Hubei province, reported RIA news agency on Saturday.
Emergency evacuations are coming at a time when upwards of 250,000 Chinese could contract the deadly virus in the next ten days, said Jonathan Read, a U.K. expert on the transmission and evolutionary dynamics of infectious diseases.
Evacuations by the U.S. are likely in response to Read's warning that suggests the outbreak could exponentially increase in the next several weeks.
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