The state will launch a seven-day lockdown at midnight tonight as Melbourne battles a new COVID-19 outbreak.
A cluster first linked to a leak in the hotel quarantine system in neighboring South Australia has now expanded to 26 positive cases, while thousands of people have been identified as close contacts.
For the next seven days, Victorians can only leave home for five reasons – shopping for necessary goods and services, authorized work or permitted education, exercise for a maximum of two hours per day, care and medical reasons, and getting a COVID-19 vaccination .
The Winton SuperSprint this weekend has already been postponed to a later time in the year. The Melbourne-based teams are still pending, however, as they face a possible border run facing lockdown.
As Motorsport.com first reported yesterday, six teams – Walkinshaw Andretti United, Erebus Motorsport, Team 18, Tickford Racing, Kelly Grove Racing and Blanchard Racing Team – are on standby to fly from Melbourne and concerns about border controls from other states to clear out.
The border with the Northern Territory is the focal point. The Darwin Triple Crown is only three weeks away.
Starting at midnight last night, anyone entering Greater Melbourne or Bendigo territory must be placed under custody for 14 days at their own expense of $ 2,500.
Unless the situation in Melbourne improves drastically, the affected teams must either be in NT quarantine or in another jurisdiction that has free access to the NT by June 3.
The New South Wales border remains open for now, which means teams could head north to find out those 14 days.
The question, however, is when to leave Melbourne with fears that even the border with NSW could break in the coming days.
Because of this, teams are ready to leave today, even though Motorsport.com knows that after the 100-day road trip they forced last year, some teams are reluctant to take another leap forward.
Under very similar circumstances, the Melbourne teams fled their state border within a few hours in July 2020 and only returned home after the Bathurst 1000 season ended in October.
