Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Meet Our New Members: Paul Thompson



Paul (left) with Kelly Collins and Casey Hathorne, training with
Handicap SCUBA Association.
Originally from Colorado, Paul grew up in Missouri.  He’s a tribal citizen of the Western Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma, where much of his extended family lives.  His hobbies are astronomy, scuba diving, computers and Cherokee history.

Paul recently retired from Northrop Grumman Corporation with 31 years of service as a Senior Field Engineer. He retired from the U.S. Army Reserves in 2002 after 26 years of active and reserve duty.  He served all over the world including tours in Africa and Europe and worked as a Disaster Preparedness Officer to FEMA Region IX headquarters.  In this assignment he was the Army’s Liaison to 50 Native American Nations. 

He learned at an early age to canoe and drive boats. Being a scuba diver, Paul has learned first-hand how unsafe our waterways can be.  Once his dive boat captain had to report two jet skiers to the Coast Guard for buzzing around his dive flag.  This incident helped him decide to join the Coast Guard Auxiliary to promote boating safety.