Fox News Flash top headlines for April 2
Fox News Flash top headlines are here. Check out what's clicking on Foxnews.com.
Get all the latest news on coronavirus and more delivered daily to your inbox. Sign up here.
Carrying more than a million N95 masks, the New England Patriots’ private plane touched down in the U.S. Thursday, returning from China to deliver protective gear for frontline workers battling the coronavirus outbreak in Massachusetts and other hard-hit states.
The tightly coordinated mission reportedly overcame regulatory hurdles just to get permission to land in China, where the crew was told to remain on the plane while people on the ground loaded the cargo.
Palettes of N95 respirator masks are off-loaded from the New England Patriots football team's customized Boeing 767 jet on the tarmac, Thursday, April 2, 2020, at Logan Airport, in Boston, after returning from China. The Kraft family deployed the Patriots team plane to China to fetch more than one million masks for use by front-line health care workers to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)
“I’ve never seen so much red tape in so many ways and obstacles that we had to overcome,” team owner Robert Kraft told the Wall Street Journal.
The jet had only a 3-hour window to accept the supplies and took off with just 3 minutes to spare, the paper reported.
CLICK HERE FOR COMPLETE CORONAVIRUS COVERAGE
The Patriots said on Twitter that the Chinese tech conglomerate Tencent played a “vital” role in setting up logistics and storing the medical supplies.
The jet landed at Boston’s Logan International Airport, where a trailer normally used to haul the team’s sporting equipment around the country received about a quarter of the masks to deliver to New York City, a COVID-19 hotspot that direly needs personal protection equipment (PPE) for its frontline workers.
Along the way, the truck will also deliver masks to Providence, R.I., which has also been hit hard.
The Kraft family reportedly paid $2 million for 1.7 million masks. But about half a million masks were left behind due to additional red tape. They will be shipped separately.
“Huge thanks to the Krafts and several dedicated partners for making this happen,” Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker tweeted.
Massachusetts had the seventh-most confirmed coronavirus cases among U.S. states as of Thursday evening with at least 7,738 and at least 122 deaths. Country-wide, there were at least 238,820 cases, with 92,381 of them in New York.
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
Fox News’ Ryan Gaydos contributed to this report.
Fox News First
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox.
By entering your email and clicking the Subscribe button, you agree to the Fox News Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, and agree to receive content and promotional communications from Fox News. You understand that you can opt-out at any time.