Virus Curbs Force Oil, Mine Workers to Move Across a Continent
- Staff who commute thousands of miles in Australia relocating
- BHP, Woodside seeking to handle tighter internal travel curbs
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Some of the biggest mining and energy companies are scrambling to respond to tightening controls on movement inside Australia -- the biggest exporter of iron ore and liquefied natural gas -- by temporarily rehousing employees and their families thousands of miles from home.
About 800 so-called fly-in fly-out, or FIFO, mining workers have been relocated to Western Australia for potentially the next three months, and around 300 to Queensland, along with scores of people staffing offshore oil and gas operations, according to the Australian Workers’ Union.