Measles Scare on Flight From DR Holds Up Plane at JFK
A measles scare onboard a plane from the Dominican Republic to New York City held up the arrival for passengers on a JetBlue flight Sunday night.
JetBlue Flight 410 landed at JFK Airport from Santo Domingo around 9 p.m., but was held from arriving at the terminal after officials got reports of a medical emergency on the plane.
Out of an abundance of caution, the Port Authority temporarily quarantined the plane while the passengers got checked out. A short time later all customers got the all clear and flyers deplaned normally, JetBlue said in a statement.
Some passengers told News 4 they weren’t sure what was going on, but rumors were circulating that somebody may have had measles.
“Some sort of medic type guy came on with a mask and a police man, probably Port Authority, with a mask looked at the kid and decided that it was probably mosquito bites,” one passenger said.
A Passover program director said he organized the trip for Orthodox families and said JetBlue crews saw an Orthodox Jewish boy with mosquito bites and unfairly profiled him as having measles.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said last week that 695 measles cases had been reported this year nationwide, with nearly 400 cases confirmed in New York alone.
Measles is a highly contagious disease, and symptoms include rash, high fever, cough and red, watery eyes.
Photo Credit: Avrumy Jordan
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from NBC New York - Top Stories http://bit.ly/2XSP09T
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