On Wednesday afternoon, Manassas, Virginia, saw 16 private aircrafts fly over the city to honor health care workers fighting the coronavirus. Pilots took off from Manassas Regional Airport about 1 p.m. and made the 15-minute flight over historic downtown Manassas, then over the Novant Health UVA Health System Prince William Medical Center and back to the airport.

The idea came from Manassas resident Edie Clark, who also works as a volunteer at the hospital. “I watched the fly over in April by the Navy and Air Force, and I thought, ‘Why can’t we do that out of our local airport?'” Clark told WTOP. Clark reached out to the regional airport with the idea, and it was able to round up 16 pilots for the fly over. “They all volunteered to do it and on their own dime and their own fuel,” said Jolene Berry, the senior operations officer with the regional airport.

A crowd of health care workers could be seen gathering outside the Prince William Medical Center as the planes went by. “We are honored to have local pilots join together in a fly over tribute to our health care heroes,” said Stephen Smith, president and chief operating officer of the health center, in a release. “We wanted to let all those people we know who are working there that we care about them,” Clark said.

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