Ernest DelBuono

Ernest DelBuono, who chairs Levick’s Crisis Practice, provides our clients with the benefits of more than 25 years’ experience as a crisis management professional, including crisis planning, response, media relations, and coaching.

Mr. DelBuono has worked in transportation, petrochemical, consumer products, finance, healthcare, hospitality, food and beverage, defense, homeland security, and many other industries. These high-profile crisis engagements involved airline disasters, SUV rollovers, product recalls, natural disasters, eco-terrorism, cruise ship safety, executive misconduct, environmental incidents, and earnings restatements.

After the 9/11 attacks, Mr. DelBuono was a first responder at Dulles Airport where he assisted American Airlines in setting up and managing the family assistance center, providing care to the loved ones of Flight 77 passengers killed at the Pentagon.

Mr. DelBuono also has significant international experience setting up global crisis management programs for multinational corporations in the biotech, paper products, hospitality, and manufacturing industries. While living and working in Rome, he developed a communications strategy for an Italian systems engineering company.

A retired Coast Guard commander, Mr. DelBuono served as press assistant to the Commandant of the Coast Guard and public affairs officer to the Federal On-Scene Coordinator during the Exxon Valdez oil spill cleanup. He was a first responder to chemical spills, vessel groundings, marine collisions, fires, and groundwater contamination incidents. He assisted in establishing the Coast Guard’s National Pollution Funds Center where he designed and implemented communications programs related to the controversial Oil Pollution Act of 1990.

Mr. DelBuono also served as Deputy Director of the Federal Joint Information Center for Hurricane Andrew and was a member of the U.S. delegation to the United Nation’s International Maritime Organization in London. Currently, he is a member of ASIS International, serving on the Crisis Management & Business Continuity council.

Mr. DelBuono graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in political science from Villanova University and earned a Master of Science in public relations from Boston University.