MIAMI – Aerial spraying to kill mosquitoes took place Thursday morning, a day after weather postponed the original flight.
The plane took off from Miami Executive Airport at 6 a.m. and was scheduled to be in the air for an hour, spraying pesticides over Miami's Wynwood neighborhood.
The crew and aircraft used in the operation was flown in from Sarasota. The King Air Beechcraft fixed-wing, dual-engine plane is specially equipped with nozzles on the wing to disperse the chemical, called Naled, that is meant to kill adult mosquitoes that could be carrying the Zika virus.
Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez directed the county's Mosquito Control team on Tuesday to begin larvicide and adulticide aerial spraying in the 10-square-mile area where locally acquired cases of the Zika virus have been reported or are being investigated, but weather conditions Wednesday postponed the spraying to Thursday morning.
The plane and crew will fly back to Sarasota after the spray Thursday morning, but Mayor Gimenez has ordered aerial spraying to continue every seven days for the next four weeks.
