SARASOTA, Fla. — The staff at the Lucky Pelican Bistro in Sarasota continue to grieve after a fellow employee died due to complications from COVID-19. 

“It's devastating and that even feels like an understatement of what it’s like to go through this,” managing partner and general manager Patrick Moore said.

Moore said the restaurant will never be the same following the loss of Mario, one of the restaurant's line cooks. 

“Mario, his last day of work was the Friday before 4th of July,” Moore stated. “And Sunday, July 5th he started feeling a couple symptoms and just had a little hard time breathing. With everything that's going around, he made the smart call and when he got tested." 

The test came back positive and Mario’s condition did not improve. Soon after getting his test results back, he passed away. 

“The hardest loss I’ve had in my life was when I lost my mom about 10 years ago,” Moore stated holding back tears, “This is feeling like a close second.”

According to Moore, he closed the restaurant's doors soon after learning from Mario about his positive test result. He said it's hard to think about reopening.

“It’s not a matter of what date we are opening up, but again how safe we can be and to get to the planning step of when we’ll open," he explained. "We need to know as a team where we’re at before we can even talk about what day.”

That won't happen until they’ve mourned the death of not just a coworker, but a friend. 

“He was a very hardworking and caring person and he was a father,” Moore said.

Mario was just 34 years old. A GoFundme campaign has been set up on his family's behalf. To learn more or to make a donation, visit https://www.gofundme.com/f/mario039s-memorial-fund.