Monroe County Airport Professional Firefighters - Airport bustles with comings & goings

Airport bustles with comings, goings

By Alan Morrell
Democrat and Chronicle

(Friday, April 19, 2002) -- ON THIS Tuesday, workers at Greater Rochester International Airport are bracing for a big rush.

In just a few days, the annual spring break travel season will be under way. Students, teachers and their families will be heading en masse to Florida.

"Let the games begin," says airport director Terry Slaybaugh. "Beginning Thursday (April 11), every flight is booked. Everyone will be trying to go to Florida."

Orlando already is the second most-popular destination for Rochester travelers, after New York City. With the spring-break push, Rochesterians also will be flocking to other Florida hotspots, including Daytona Beach, Tampa and Fort Lauderdale.

The business spike is welcome news for Slaybaugh. The airport, like other travel-related businesses, has been hit hard by the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Most of the airport -- about 60 to 70 percent -- actually is in Rochester, says engineer Gary Gaskin. A smidge, about 1 or 2 percent, is officially in Gates and the rest is in Chili.

About 190 flights leave Rochester daily, with about 7,000 passengers, Slaybaugh says. The number of passengers is off about 16 percent from what it was at the same time last year, he says.

As airport director, Slaybaugh's job is to get more people to use the Rochester airport. Since Sept. 11, Slaybaugh -- like airport directors throughout the country -- has spent a lot of time on security issues, also.

Today, in fact, Slaybaugh has a meeting with security personnel. The nature of the conversation is confidential.

Also today, a class of students from the Archangels School on Lyell Road is visiting. Slaybaugh invites them in his office to tell them about what it's like to run an airport.

Planning for the annual visit by the Blue Angels -- part of the airport's airshow, which will be June 22 and 23 -- also is on his itinerary.

"I have my organized, get-things-done-today list," Slaybaugh says later. "But you have to be able to adjust to the events of the day. Every day is different."

Some aspects are the same. Commercial flights start leaving the airport at 6 a.m. Incoming flights arrive as late as 12:30 a.m. Air cargo operates from 10:30 p.m. to 7:30 a.m. Overnight crews clean and fuel the planes.

Every day, 800 employees from 58 companies do business at the 1,145-acre airport, including the airlines, food servers, rental car companies and taxis.

Then, there is the airport fire department.

Located almost directly in the center of the airport, the department responds to fuel spills and medical calls on airport grounds, supports other area fire departments and handles aircraft-related calls. Twenty-two firefighters work there, with five on duty at any one time. The county's Hazardous Materials vehicle is stored at the airport firehouse, along with five or six high-performance rescue rigs.

Much of the firefighters' time involves drills and helping to train other fire agencies, says Fire Chief Bob Spiegel. Fortunately, Spiegel says, they handle only about 50 aircraft-related calls annually, few of which are serious.

"I come to work with the feeling, 'Today is the day we're going to do our job,' " says Spiegel, a 19-year veteran who has been chief for six years. "But they never happen."

He is not complaining, mind you. There has been plenty of excitement and danger.

The airport fire department has assisted with other major blazes, including the December CSX derailment and chemical spill in Charlotte; a 1998 chemical fire at Safety-Kleen Corp. in Avon, Livingston County; and a 1995 tanker explosion and fire on Interstate 390.

The heavy-duty stuff.

"If they're calling for the airport trucks, something bad is happening," Spiegel says. "The most dangerous call I've responded to involved a 727 that had a total hydraulic failure and could not line up as it was approaching the runway. It was the scariest call I can remember."

The pilot safely landed the plane and no one was injured.

There are dozens of other components involved in keeping an airport running, including the operations people who mow the lawns, sweep the runways and use flash explosions to keep seagulls from getting in the way of planes. There are, of course, the thousands of daily travelers