Van Gogh painting stolen in Netherlands
THE HAGUE, Netherlands -- A painting by Dutch master Vincent van Gogh was stolen in an overnight smash-and-grab raid on a museum that was closed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, police and the museum said Monday.
The Singer Laren museum east of Amsterdam said that "The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring 1884" by the Dutch master was taken in the early hours of Monday. By early afternoon, all that could be seen from the outside of the museum was a large white panel covering a door in the building's glass facade.
Museum General Director Evert van Os said the institution that houses the collection of American couple William and Anna Singer is "angry, shocked, sad" at the theft.
The value of the work, which was on loan from the Groninger Museum in the northern Dutch city of Groningen was not immediately known. Van Gogh's paintings, when they rarely come up for sale, fetch millions at auction.
"I'm shocked and unbelievably annoyed that this has happened," said Singer Laren museum director Jan Rudolph de Lorm.
Police are investigating the theft.
Infected ship passengers go to hospital
PERTH, Australia -- More than 800 cruise ship passengers and crew were heading home to Germany on chartered flights on Monday while 41 others infected with the coronavirus were admitted to an Australian hospital after an argument over where they should be treated among local medical personnel.
Health authorities initially wanted to send the sick passengers aboard the cruise ship Artania to the Hollywood and Bethesda hospitals in the city of Perth. But nurses and doctors' groups argued that those hospitals were not equipped to cope with the disease. The federal government then struck a deal with the private Joondalup Health Campus, which was already treating patients with covid-19, the disease caused by the virus.
"This humanitarian hospital care will be provided in one of the state's premier facilities, which is fully prepared for and is already treating covid-19 patients," Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said in a statement Monday.
Western Australia state Premier Mark McGowan said 844 Artania passengers and crew had begun flying home on four chartered flights on Monday.
"I understand about 479 crew members remain on the ship and I expect and hope that that ship will leave Western Australia in coming days," McGowan told reporters.
Around 200 Australians who reside in Western Australia and were aboard another cruise ship that arrived off Perth over the weekend, Vasco da Gama, were ferried on Monday to the vacation destination of Rottnest Island to be isolated for two weeks.
Another 600 Australians will be quarantined in a Perth hotel for two weeks.
Philippine officials ground Lionair planes
MANILA, Philippines -- Philippine aviation officials on Monday grounded all aircraft belonging to a company that owns a plane that caught fire while taking off from Manila's airport, killing all eight people on board.
All of Lionair Inc.'s aircraft will remain grounded during the investigation of the burning of its Westwind 24 plane late Sunday, they said. The plane had been used earlier to transport medical supplies for the coronavirus outbreak.
Lionair, a Philippine-based charter company, is not related to Lion Air, an Indonesian airline.
The twin-engine aircraft was on a medical evacuation mission when it caught fire. Two passengers from the U.S. and Canada and six Filipino flight crew and medical personnel died when the Tokyo-bound plane burst into flames on the main runway, airport general manager Ed Monreal said.
The fire prompted the closure of the airport's main runway and caused one international flight to be diverted.
The aircraft's cockpit voice recorder has been recovered by investigators, officials said.
Lionair leases executive jets, helicopters and turbo-propeller planes for domestic and foreign travel, including medical emergency flights. Lawyer Lester Ople, a spokesman for the company, said four planes and seven helicopters would be grounded and that Lionair would fully cooperate with the investigation.
Japanese ship collides with fishing boat
TOKYO -- A Japanese destroyer collided with a Chinese fishing boat in the East China Sea on Monday but no one was injured, the Defense Ministry said.
The collision caused a hole in the destroyer Shimakaze above its waterline, but it was still able to move on its own, the ministry said.
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The cause of the collision and other details including the ships' movements before the accident are under investigation, the ministry said.
The site of the accident, about 400 miles west of the Japanese island of Yakushima, is far to the north of an area disputed between the two countries, it said.
Japan and China have disputes over Japanese controlled-islands that China also claims. The uninhabited islets are called Senkaku in Japanese and Diaoyu in Chinese.
-- Compiled by Democrat-Gazette staff from wire reports
A Section on 03/31/2020