Plane quarantined at New York airport amid reports of sick passengers

The New York City mayor's office says a plane has been quarantined at New York's Kennedy Airport amid reports of numerous ill passengers aboard a flight from Dubai.

The Emirates flight landed around 9:10 am Wednesday.

Video from news helicopters showed the jet sitting on the tarmac surrounded by ambulances, emergency vehicles, and airport personnel.

Eric Phillips, a spokesman for Mayor Bill de Blasio, says representatives of the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention were on the scene.

Phillips tweeted that the flight stopped in Mecca, which is experiencing a flu outbreak, and "early indications point to that as a possibility."

Airline representatives did not immediate respond to an email.

A New York police counterterrorism division tweeted it appeared to be a "medical situation".