JetBlue will do a flyover of New York City with 3 planes on Thursday evening

A week after the U.S. Navy's Blue Angels and the Air Force's Thunderbirds overflew New York City to show support for health care and essential workers, JetBlue is about to do the same.

The New York City-based airline will fly three Airbus A320s at low altitude over the city's five boroughs on Thursday, May 7, between 7 and 8 p.m. in what it called the "JetBlue Flyover Salute." A map published by the airline shows the planes taking off from their home base at JFK airport then proceeding to fly over every borough before returning to JFK.

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For the occasion, JetBlue is using three of its aircraft wearing special colors with New York-centric themes: one painted blue and dedicated to the New York Police Department, one in red for the New York Fire Department, and a third one wearing an "I Love New York" livery.

All of the three A320s that will perform the flyover have been operating regular flights lately, while 177 of the airline's 265 jets are currently grounded due to the coronavirus pandemic, according to fleet-tracking site Planespotters.

JetBlue pointed out in a press release that the flyover involves no cost for the airline thanks to partners including an unnamed company that provided the fuel.

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The flyover is timed to concide with the daily 7 p.m. clap for health care workers, when New Yorkers clap and bang pots and pans from their windows and balconies to salute the people who are fighting the COVID-19 pandemic in person.

JetBlue also said it's starting an initiative to directly help those health care workers by donating flights. According to a statement by the airline, the public can nominate a health care worker to receive one of 90,000 pairs of roundtrip flight certificates for two, "to use when the time is right." Through May 15, you can submit a name and description of why the person is being nominated at jetblue.com/healthcarehero. The airline is also donating pairs of roundtrip flight certificates to 10,000 healthcare workers at the Mount Sinai Health System and NYC Health + Hospitals.