The personnel were under strict medical observation on board the nuclear-powered carrier, which had most recently been taking part in exercises with northern European navies in the Baltic Sea.

“The first cases showed symptoms recently,” the ministry said in a statement. “There are no signs of aggravated cases among the patients.”

The French aircraft carrier would dock in Toulon, southern France, in the next few days, a spokesman for the head of the armed forces told Reuters. It had been due back on April 23.

The Charles de Gaulle set sail for the eastern Mediterranean on Jan. 21 to support French military operations purportedly against militants in Iraq and Syria, before deploying to the Atlantic and then the Baltic.

It has 1,760 personnel on board.

A team equipped to carry out tests for coronavirus infection was on Wednesday due to land on the vessel, which is equipped with its own intensive care facilities.

Last week, the US Navy relieved the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt’s captain of his command, after the leak of a scathing letter he sent to superiors that sought stronger measures for curbing a coronavirus outbreak aboard his vessel.

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“We find ourselves in a crisis that will last, in a health situation that will not improve any time soon,” Edouard Philippe said after a cabinet meeting held by videoconference, as 365 deaths were reported in France in a single day.

The premier called on an alarm that France must “remain extremely mobilized” in the fight against the coronavirus epidemic that has now killed 1,696 people on French soil.

Having started in the country’s east, the epidemic is now spreading in the northernmost Hauts-de-France region, the Paris region and other areas with “an extremely high surge that puts the entire healthcare system, the entire hospital system, under enormous pressure,” Philippe said, AFP reported.

“The situation will be difficult in the days to come,” he added.

He said he would announce more details of the government’s response Saturday with Health Minister Olivier Veran, in particular regarding the availability of equipment, masks and virus testing.

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