A third student is being investigated by police after she flew out of Covid-hit Auckland without permission – further emphasising the possibility numerous other rule breakers might have exploited lax airport security and slipped out of the city during lockdown.

The Te Herenga Waka–Victoria University student travelled to Wellington on Wednesday afternoon, just hours before changes to security at Auckland Airport were announced.

Those changes came after Stuff revealed two other students had breached level 4 restrictions – designed to contain cases of Covid-19 connected to the Delta outbreak – when they flew without the required exemption from Auckland to Wellington and Auckland to Dunedin on Sunday and Monday.

''A resident of one of our halls of residence arrived back in the hall yesterday, Wednesday, after breaching the New Zealand Government travel orders,'' a spokeswoman for the university said on Thursday afternoon.

''This follows another student returning to one of our halls last Sunday. Neither student had an exemption to travel or permission to return. The resident is isolating in alternative university accommodation under Public Health Authority oversight.''

Sources told Stuff the student who flew to Wellington on Wednesday was intercepted before she returned to the university.

She did not enter the halls.

Personal travel in level 4 is strictly limited to “essential personal movement” and an exemption must be obtained first.

It’s understood the student claimed to have such an exemption, but that was not the case.

Senior Sergeant Jason McCarthy, officer in charge of youth and community Wellington, said police “will be undertaking an assessment as to what enforcement action may be taken”.

On Thursday afternoon, before news of the third breach, Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins was unable to say how many people might have flown out of Auckland without the appropriate exemption during lockdown.

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Aviation Security (Avsec) staff were stationed at the doors of Auckland Airport and should have been checking people’s eligibility to travel before they entered the terminal, he said.

“They would have to produce documentation, so ... something has gone wrong here. I don't know whether that's [because] the information that was being asked for was not being thoroughly checked or whether it was that incorrect information was being supplied by the person who was making it through.”

An investigation “to find out exactly what's happened here” was ongoing, Hipkins said.

However, everyone was now going through a rigorous screening process before entering the airport terminal.

Avsec, a government agency reporting to the transport minister, announced the new six-step system on Wednesday night, after it earlier said it was “reviewing the processes for checking passenger eligibility”.

A Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet spokesperson said it was “very disappointing to learn of another person flying from Auckland when they shouldn’t have”.

With Auckland still at alert level 4, it was important that “everyone stays local to stop the virus spreading”.

“Aviation Security Service has made changes to its processes, so passengers are now stopped before they enter an airport and are asked for a document that shows they are eligible to travel,” the spokesperson said.

“We appreciate the vigilance of universities when they have discovered their students’ travel. We will be contacting universities and student associations to ask them to reinforce the message that students cannot travel between regions at the moment.”

Stuff reported on Tuesday that an Otago student, who had initially gone home to Auckland for lockdown, was able to fly to Christchurch and then board a connecting flight to Dunedin on Monday without a travel exemption.

It was then revealed a Victoria University student had broken the rules when they flew from Auckland to Wellington on Sunday.

The student, aged in her late teens who said she was unaware of the rules and upset by the incident, told Stuff she was “never asked for documentation” or to show an exemption.

“The Air New Zealand website didn't check when I booked, as well as the airport – that's why I thought I was able to. On the flight no-one was checking anything.”

The number of new community cases, all of which are in Auckland, dropped to 49 on Thursday.

There are four new cases in managed isolation. There are 42 cases in hospital – six are in ICU and three patients are being ventilated.

The total number of active cases is 725, with 709 in Auckland and 16 in Wellington. Eleven people have now recovered.