Virtual Deinstallation During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed many aspects of life and how work is accomplished. Travel restrictions and health concerns have hindered courier trips, making virtual condition reports and deinstallations necessary to retrieve loans. However, transmission pathways of the virus and the related viral attenuation on different materials and surfaces influence employee safety concerns when multiple people interact with surfaces, requiring quarantine periods or disinfection guidelines to be written to address these concerns. This paper illustrates how the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) and the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) worked together virtually to safely return an important 1933 map to the US from England using quarantine periods. Keywords: Virtual deinstallation, COVID-19, materials, viral attenuation, guidelines, REALM data