'It's a shame': Tourists disappointed that Eiffel Tower has shut due to coronavirus

Record ID: 1463971

  • Title: 'It's a shame': Tourists disappointed that Eiffel Tower has shut due to coronavirus
  • Date: 14th March 2020
  • Summary: PARIS, FRANCE (MARCH 14, 2020) (REUTERS) SPARSE CROWDS NEAR EIFFEL TOWER SIGN READING (French): "Due to the Covid-19 epidemic, the Eiffel tower will be closed for an indeterminate period." CLOSED ENTRY TOURIST FROM MEXICO, YUNUEN NYSSEN, TAKING SELFIE WITH FAMILY PHONE (SOUNDBITE) (English) TOURIST FROM MEXICO, YUNUEN NYSSEN, SAYING: "Well, actually it's a shame because we planned this trip about a year ago, we are Mexican citizens, all we can do is take pictures from the outside." VARIOUS OF TOURISTS READING MAP NEXT TO EIFFEL TOWER (SOUNDBITE) (English) TOURIST FROM INDIA, SUPRIYA, SAYING: "We're here for the Eiffel tower, we planned it in November, and it did not work out, so we already had our flight tickets booked, and we couldn't cancel it, so that's the reason why we are here, even after there was a closure, we read the news, and we knew there could be a closure. But we thought we cannot cancel our flight for the second time because we can't put our hard-earned money at stake." TOUR BUS DRIVING PAST EIFFEL TOWER MINI EIFFEL TOWER ORNAMENTS VENDOR PACKING MINI EIFFEL TOWER IN BAG MINI EIFFEL TOWERS FRENCH STUDENTS SITTING NEXT TO EIFFEL TOWER EMPTY EIFFEL TOWER (SOUNDBITE) (French) FRENCH PART-TIME STUDENT, OUMAIMA IAMRHARI, ASKED ABOUT THE BANNING OF PUBLIC GATHERINGS OF MORE THAN 100 PEOPLE, SAYING: "It's sad that it wasn't done a few weeks ago, the fact that it hasn't been done until now, it's a bit late, because there are already a lot of cases that have been spread, they should have done it sooner." PEOPLE WALKING PAST VARIOUS OF TOURIST WEARING MASK TAKING PHOTO
  • Embargoed: 28th March 2020 17:00
  • Keywords: Coronavirus Eiffel tower French government tourists
  • Location: PARIS, FRANCE
  • City: PARIS, FRANCE
  • Country: France
  • Topics: Health/Medicine
  • Reuters ID: LVA002C50XFEV
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Tourists who travelled from far and wide to go up on Paris' famed Eiffel tower were disappointed on Saturday (March 14), the day after the French government banned gatherings of more than 100 people to curb the spread of coronavirus.
    The tower, which shut from 2100 (2000 GMT) on Friday (March 13), was among the top tourist landmarks that closed their doors to the public. Its management said it would reopen as soon as health conditions allowed.
    Instead of going up the tower, the sparse amount of tourists that turned up had to resort to taking selfies outside the attraction instead.
    The coronavirus outbreak has so far killed 79 in France and infected more than 3,600 others.
    (Production: Yiming Woo)
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2020. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
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