Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport Executive Director Carl Beardsley Jr. has taken a sabbatical leave, an airport co-solicitor said Tuesday.
“He’s taken a sabbatical and I really can’t discuss personnel and health issues,” attorney Don Frederickson said.
Efforts to reach Beardsley, 56, a Lackawanna County resident, were unsuccessful.
“They’re not trying to get rid of him or anything like that,” Frederickson said. “They like Carl. The intent is he’s going to come back.”
Frederickson said he informed the staff of the leave on Monday. Assistant executive director B.J. Teichman will run the airport in Beardsley’s absence, Frederickson said.
Beardsley replaced 25-year director Barry Centini in January 2015 and led the airport to record-breaking departure numbers. From August 2018 until February 2020, the airport broke monthly departure records in 17 of 19 months. The streak ended in March 2020 with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2019, 296,632 boarded commercial airlines from the airport, still its annual record.
