FALL OUT

The pandemic has sent American workers plummeting into a safety net that wasn’t prepared to catch them

- Claire Suddath

Chrissy Ormond De Swardt was having a cookout when she learned she’d lost her job. She and her husband, Bennie De Swardt, had spent the first week of March in Indian Wells, Calif., setting up for the BNP Paribas Open, a two-week tennis tournament expected to draw half a million spectators. Chrissy works in event production, overseeing players’ walk-out routines, award presentations, and other minutiae. Bennie, a camera operator and supervisor, makes sure the matches look good on TV.

On March 8, the night before the qualifying rounds were set to start, the couple invited some colleagues over to the house where they were staying for a barbecue. Bennie grilled salmon and steak as people debated whether Rafael Nadal or Novak Djokovic would beat the defending champion, Dominic Thiem. Chrissy was inside getting napkins when her phone buzzed with a text from a friend: “BNP IS CANCELED?! What does that mean for you and Bennie?!” Confused, Chrissy checked the event’s website. A banner appeared, announcing that because of confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Coachella Valley, the tournament wouldn’t be held. It was the first professional sports event to be canceled in the U.S.