NY cancels traditional Macy's Thanksgiving parade, will hold virtual event

This year's Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade will be "reimagined" amid the coronavirus pandemic, with organizers opting to make the iconic holiday season kick-off event virtual.

"It will not be the same parade we're used to," New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) said Monday during a news briefing.

"It will be a different kind of event," de Blasio said of the traditional balloon and crowd-packed festivities, which date back nearly a century.

"They're reinventing the event for this moment in history, and you'll be able to enjoy the spirit, the joy of that day on television and online," de Blasio said.

The event won't be "a live parade," de Blasio added, but will be something "that will really give us that warmth, and that great feeling we have on Thanksgiving Day."

The annual Macy's spectacle is hardly the first large-scale parade to be nixed or altered due to COVID-19.

Organizers announced in July that California's annual Rose Parade, which was originally to be held Jan. 1, 2021, would not take place. Cities across the country also canceled St. Patrick's Day parades as more coronavirus cases were confirmed back in March.