Spring 2021 Buffalo Business 9
Located on the
southwestern coast
of Florida, the
Sarasota Bradenton
International Airport
hosts nine airlines and
serves nearly 2 million
passengers each year.
Rick Piccolo, BS '81, has been leading
the charge as president and CEO of the small
hub airport since 1995.
Most days find Piccolo managing things
like financial reports, capital construc-
tion projects, regulatory issues and the
people who make it all work. Occasionally
there are days that break out of the norm,
as in December 2019, when a truck crashed
through a wall into the baggage claim area
and caused $250,000 in damage.
Other times, "shock events" come along
that change the landscape of the entire
industry, such as SARS, 9/11 or the 2007-08
financial crisis. According to the Airline
Passenger Experience Association, travel
demand in the U.S. fell by more than 30%
in the immediate aermath of 9/11, with a
loss of more than 62,000 jobs. The industry
didn't fully recover for nearly three years.
Piccolo says that even as 9/11 changed
the airport's entire operations overnight,
the COVID-19 pandemic made an even
bigger impact.
"We had a record year in 2019 and were
the fastest growing airport in the U.S., with
traffic up 53%," he says. "We were expecting to
hit the highest number of passengers in our
history in March, but about halfway through
the month our traffic dropped 95%. I've never
seen anything like it."
School of Management alumni like
Piccolo have been at the forefront of efforts
to lead the airline industry through the
crisis wrought by the coronavirus, help-
ing their companies and fellow employees
weather the storm.
Air travel came to a crawl in 2020,
but as safety measures improve and
TURBULENT
