Cape Girardeau native Mike Van de Ven has been named president of Southwest Airlines, one of the nation's largest air carriers.

A 1980 graduate of Cape Girardeau Central High School, Van de Ven joined the Dallas-based airline in 1993 and has served in numerous leadership positions, including executive vice president and chief operating officer, executive vice president of aircraft operations, senior vice president of planning, vice president of financial planning and analysis, and director of internal audit.

He will continue to serve as Southwest's COO in addition to his new role as president.

Before joining Southwest, Van de Ven was a senior audit manager at Ernst & Young in Dallas, where the airline was among his first clients.

Announcement of Van de Ven's promotion was made earlier this month by Southwest chairman and CEO Gary Kelly, who also announced Tom Nealon, 60, was retiring from the presidency. The leadership changes were effective Sept. 13.

"I'm thrilled for Mike as he assumes his new role as president in addition to COO," Kelly said. "Mike is as talented and dedicated a leader as one will find and he has directly contributed to Southwest's success during his 28 years serving the company and our people."

Van de Ven, 59, graduated in 1984 from the University of Texas at Austin, where he serves on the McCombs School of Business advisory council. He is a certified public accountant and also serves on the board of Comerica Inc., a financial services company headquartered in Dallas.

Now in its 51st year, Southwest has more than 54,000 employees and a customer base that topped 130 million passengers in the pre-pandemic year of 2019. During the peak travel season that year, Southwest operated more than 4,000 weekday departures to 101 destinations in the United States and 10 additional countries.

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