He survived a plane crash and went through a period of deep personal suffering. From that experience came his devotion to Padre Pio, which led him to commission a life-size statue of the saint in a park he built at his own expense, open to the public seven days a week from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.
The central figure is Joe Oppedisano, owner of Bacco Ristorante on Northern Boulevard in Little Neck, New York, who has traveled to Italy many times to visit Padre Pio’s tomb in San Giovanni Rotondo.
The first time Oppedisano felt Padre Pio’s presence in his life was nearly 16 years ago, in 2010, as he was preparing to open Il Bacco Ristorante in its current location. He had run the restaurant for many years at another spot on the same block in Little Neck, but as the business grew, he needed a larger space.
Oppedisano, who was born in Calabria in 1958, moved from southern Italy to the United States at the age of 13 and went on to become a restaurateur. He explained that he had not always been devoted to Padre Pio. Three days before the restaurant’s opening, a colleague gave him a small statue of the saint. As he looked at it, Joe told NETV, he began to cry like a child, overcome by an inexplicable sense of peace.
The second time he felt Padre Pio’s intercession was on October 4, 2020, when he survived a plane crash in the Long Island Sound near the Throgs Neck Bridge. Oppedisano, who is a licensed pilot, was flying a single-engine Cessna with two friends and was preparing to land when a boat suddenly blocked his path.
“In a split second, everything changed,” he said. As he tried to avoid the boat, the plane crashed into a dock and was destroyed. Joe suffered serious injuries but survived.
