Three months after Australia was plunged into lockdown to thwart the spread of COVID-19, Simon Hickey took the reins overseeing construction of the nation’s first major airport in half a century.
asserted
Hickey → plunge → century
Navigating the unknowns of a pandemic was quickly followed by floods in western Sydney, bushfires and locust and mouse plagues.
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Navigating → navigate → Sydney
Through sheer coincidence, the Western Sydney International Airport chief executive has often found himself at the centre of crises.
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executive → find → crises
Twenty-five years ago, he was in his office in New York’s landmark MetLife Building working for Bovis Lend Lease when a colleague rushed in to tell him the World Trade Centre was on fire.
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Centre → work → fire
“If you stepped outside my office, you could just look down and see the World Trade Centre,” he recalls.
uncertain
he → step → Centre
“There was so much smoke, and then there was a flash, which was clearly the second plane going in.
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which → be → ?
We turned on CNN, and it looked like a small plane.
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it → turn → plane
And then they slowed it down, so you could see what was going on, and it was clearly a passenger airplane.
uncertain
it → slow → it
We realised at that point that there was a terrorist attack.
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We → realise → point
That was the only thing that would cause that.”
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that → cause → that
The next day in a near-deserted Manhattan, Hickey – then the Australian company’s most senior executive in the Americas – visited the site of what became known as Ground Zero.
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what → desert → Zero
“[It was] a moment in time when the world changed,” he says.
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he → change → time
In the chaotic days that followed the September 11 terrorist attacks, Hickey played a pivotal role after Bovis Lend Lease was awarded a contract for the rescue mission.
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Lease → follow → mission
“It did change me in a way.
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It → change → way
It makes you a little introspective … about what you want to do in your life,” he says.
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he → make → life
A decade later, he was involved in arguably one of the most controversial decisions in Australia’s aviation history while serving as a senior Qantas executive.
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he → involve → executive
The grounding of Qantas’ entire aircraft fleet to break an industrial dispute in 2011 was, as he describes, a “monumental moment” and one he believes to this day was the right call.
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he → break → day
“I was on the executive committee that considered it, and I supported it,” he recalls.
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he → consider → it
After steering Qantas’ frequent flyer business, Hickey went on to become head of its international and freight operations.
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Hickey → steer → operations
We had to turn around an international business.
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We → have → business
It’s very different from growing a business from scratch,” he explains.
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he → ’ → scratch
These experiences have influenced the man who has overseen the complexities of building a major new international airport and enticing airlines to fly passengers there when it opens to passengers on October 25.
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it → influence → October
Hickey, 61, concedes there was a “level of scepticism” when he was at Qantas that an international airport on Sydney’s western fringe would open a decade later.
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airport → concede → fringe
He certainly did not think he would be the person leading it.
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he → think → it
“You don’t know what’s in the future,” he laughs.
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he → know → future
Having taken the reins at the Commonwealth-owned airport corporation during the early months of the pandemic in 2020, Hickey oversaw one of the largest earthmoving projects in Australia’s history as farmland was flattened for what was to become Western Sydney Airport.
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what → take → history
“We moved 27.5 million cubic metres of dirt.
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We → move → dirt
From the highest to the lowest point was the equivalent of a 12-storey building, and at one stage at the site we had the largest number of earthmoving pieces of equipment in the world,
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we → have → world
” he recalls.
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he → recall → ?
The major build was happening at the same time as work was shutting down due to the pandemic.
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work → happen → pandemic
And as the focus turned to constructing the runway and terminal, Hickey and his team faced two years when western Sydney was struck by one-in-100 year floods.
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Sydney → turn → floods
“In a building project that’s exactly what you don’t want to see.
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you → ’ → what
We got excellent at working in those conditions, and kept on moving forward,” he says.
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he → get → conditions
“We had two major plagues that came through after that.
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that → have → that
We had a mouse plague and there was a locust plague.
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We → have → plague
The problem with that is they eat your cables.
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they → eat → cables
We’ve had bushfires up to the boundary.”
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We → have → boundary
The first passenger flight from Western Sydney International (Nancy-Bird Walton) Airport on October 25 fires the starter’s gun on competition with Kingsford Smith Airport at Mascot.
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flight → fire → Mascot
Yet, the privately owned incumbent has shown every intention of doing its utmost to retain its vice-like grip on aviation in the Sydney basin.
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incumbent → own → basin
Hickey’s rival is Sydney Airport chief executive Scott Charlton, who earned a reputation as a dealmaker from his long tenure expanding Transurban into a toll-road powerhouse.
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who → earn → powerhouse
…and 20 more, not listed.
The Aporia
