Health Minister Brad Hazzard announced on Saturday morning that our city had recorded its first confirmed COVID-19 cases since last year.

There has been one other case in the Northern Tablelands region this year, recorded when a man with the virus returned from the Northern Territory to Glen Innes.

The region had several cases in the early days of the pandemic, in March and April last year, and the first of those COVID-19 cases arrived in the Northern Tablelands by train.

It's a similar story this time with NSW Health announcing on Saturday that the train service to Armidale was an exposure site for the current cases.

Back in late March last year, when the train arrived at Armidale's railway station, among the passengers on the Explorer from Sydney were an Inverell couple, and an Armidale resident, all returning home.

Aged in their 80s, the Inverell couple had been on a cruise, spending a holiday on the Voyager of the Seas, which had docked in Sydney on March 19. That was the same day passengers got off the Ruby Princess at Circular Quay.

After departing the train at Armidale, the Inverell couple caught the CountryLink bus home.

Two days later, on Saturday, March 21, they were tested for the coronavirus. Both tests would come back positive the following Tuesday.

Five days after those two positive tests, Armidale had its first case.

It was a passenger from the Explorer who it is believed caught the coronavirus from the Inverell couple.

In between the Inverell and Armidale cases were a couple from Emmaville near Glen Innes, who had been passengers on the Ruby Princess.

In that same time, Inverell had another case, after 19 people returned from a group trip to Egypt. Fortunately, no other member of the group returned a positive test.

It was followed by a case in Uralla, and two more in Armidale, which were both linked to the Department of Family and Community Services office in the city.

It was never discovered how the first case in the office was contracted, but it's suspected they passed it on to a colleague, which did explain the second case.

The office was immediately closed for 24 hours following the two positive tests, and underwent a forensic cleaning operation.

The office's remaining 19 employees were tested and came back clear.

In the 15 months since then the city has also been all clear of the virus. Until this week.

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