The airport will recover. The leader of the Indianapolis Airport Authority has no doubt about that. But he's less certain about what a post-pandemic world looks like for Indianapolis International Airport and its passengers.
"There's still multiple things up in the air," Mario Rodriguez said. "No pun intended."
The situation the airport has found itself in since the pandemic is no joke. Through the end of August, passenger traffic was down 56% compared to the same time last year. More than 1,700 flights were canceled in March and April alone.
At one point airport activity dropped to as little as 5% of its typical modern operations.
It could be years before passenger traffic returns to pre-pandemic levels, leaving the airport no choice but to look ahead at what may need to change, including fewer choices and higher prices.
The impact on the airport
The pandemic has taken a toll on the health and finances of many people who keep the flights on time and the passengers happy.
Twelve Transportation Security Administration employees have tested positive for COVID-19 at IND; all but one were screening officers. More than 2,200 TSA employees have tested positive nationwide, and eight employees have died as a result of the virus.
Seventeen Indianapolis Airport Authority employees tested positive for COVID-19. The airport says no infections were linked to the workplace. The total does not include airline employees.
The authority has avoided furloughs and layoffs, though it says some staff have seen changes in role and there have been delays in filling some open positions. Airport authority employees include public safety, administrative and maintenance.
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The airlines have been less fortunate.
IndyStar asked 10 airlines that serve the Indianapolis International Airport how many Indiana employees they have laid off or furloughed in 2020. Three — Air Canada, Alaska Airlines and Spirit — did not answer.
United laid off 70 Indianapolis employees and furloughed more than 13,000 company-wide. Republic Airways furloughed nearly 300 Indianapolis employees.
Allegiant Air and American Airlines would not provide Indiana-specific numbers. Allegiant furloughed 100 pilots on Oct. 1 and another 100 pilots have been given notice for furlough at the end of the month. American said they've furloughed 19,000 people in all.
Delta, Frontier and Southwest each said they had zero involuntary furloughs or layoffs nationwide.
Collectively, carriers are losing about $5 billion per month as planes on average are only about a third full, USA Today reported.
There has certainly been less for airline employees to do. This month IND is averaging 86 daily flights to 32 nonstop markets, down from 150 flights to 41 markets last October. International traffic has ground to a halt, with zero passengers in August and a 73.6% decrease this year compared to last. The nonstop flight between Indianapolis and Paris has been temporarily shut down.
But there are bright spots. Total cargo was up 15% in August compared to August 2019 and is up 5.2% this year compared to last.
The airport also announced nonstop flights to Cancun and Memphis and planned improvements to be made with $10 million in federal funds.
Forecasting the future
The numbers look bleak, but the airport authority's leader is adamant.
"Everybody has a lot of confidence that the airport will recover," Rodriguez said. "Air travel will recover."
His reasoning is straightforward.
"There's two reasons for it to recover: Because one, it underpins the economy. And two, at the end of the day, there's no alternative."
But that doesn't mean the concourses will be teeming with passengers tomorrow.
"Now the recovery will take some time," Rodriguez said. "But recover it will. And it'll look a little bit different in the future."
Attributing a date to that future is tricky.
"Everybody has a forecast," Rodriguez said. "And we've taken a very, very conservative look at how everything comes back online, because it's not here. And it's not in the United States, (but) worldwide. In other words, air services have stopped worldwide."
His best guess: sometime between 2024 and 2025.
"So sometime in that, in that range," he said, "you're going to start seeing numbers that are similar to 2019."
That was a good year for the airport. March 2019 was the busiest month in the airport's history. The next March, passenger traffic fell by more than half.
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Henry Harteveldt, an airline, hotel and travel industry analyst with Atmosphere Research Group, agreed with Rodriguez's timetable, saying he expects pre-pandemic passenger levels to return a little more than three years after a vaccine is widely available.
In the meantime, Harteveldt expects precautions like plexiglass dividers, masks, social distancing and preflight health questions to become standard.
Rodriguez said the journey back will be one of adapting, much like the industry did after 9/11.
What could change
The first example of adaptation provided by Rodriguez is one you would already see if you flew out of the airport today: more separation between passengers as they head into security checkpoints.
The changes will be broader than that, though.
Rodriguez said he expects destinations to change, with a shift toward more hubs. This may lead to fewer choices in the future.
He also thinks flying could become more expensive.
"It may get a little bit more — right now it’s very, very inexpensive to fly — it may get a little bit more expensive as time goes on," he said, "because there's going to be less capacity in the system." He expects airlines to drop capacity because of the drop in passengers.
Harteveldt said right now airlines are using low prices to attract passengers to the extent that airfare for some traditional airlines is as low or even lower than what is typically seen from budget airlines.
While Harteveldt says prices may go back up to pre-pandemic levels, he doesn't expect them to go higher than that.
Still, he said airfare is difficult to predict because it's affected by many things. The price of jet fuel, which Rodriguez characterized as "extremely low," is a wildcard.
Jet fuel is a major cost for airlines, and Harteveldt said airlines may need to raise fares to compensate for the higher cost if or when it goes back up.
In all, the industry expert doesn't expect massive differences.
"I don't think air travel a few years from now looks or feels all that different than it did pre-COVID," Harteveldt said, "but there will be some things that we'll be doing that we'll simply accept and normalize and incorporate into our travel practices."
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With things the way they are now, what would Rodriguez say to a Hoosier mulling their first flight since the pandemic started?
“Take it. It would be fantastic. Be safe. Wear a mask. Social distance. But take your flight.”
Contact IndyStar transportation reporter Ethan May at [email protected] or 317-402-1058. Follow him on Twitter: @EthanMayJ.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: It may be 2025 before the airport is back to normal. Here's what could change.
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