March 2025 Luncheon
Monday, 7 April 2025
Reception: 1130 hrs
Luncheon: 1200 hrs
THOMAS G. HICKEY
LCDR, USCG (Ret.)
Serving In The United States Coast Guard
Highlights Of Twenty-five Years Of Service
LCDR Thomas G. Hickey, USCG (Ret.), born in Michigan and raised in Northern California, joined the U.S. Army Reserve at age 17 and served for two years after which, in 1990, he enlisted in the U.S. Coast Guard. He was the top graduate in his boot camp class at Coast Guard Training Center Cape May and was then assigned to USCG station Port Isabel, TX. In 1993 he reported to Aviation Survivalman (ASM) A-School – the Coast Guard’s Rescue Swimmer School. Tom completed tours as an operational helicopter rescue swimmer at Air Stations Savannah, GA and New Orleans, LA. Subsequently, Tom completed Officer Candidate School (OCS) and was assigned to Marine Safety Office Port Arthur, TX. Tom then applied for and was accepted to Naval flight training at Pensacola, FL in 2001 and qualified as a helicopter pilot in 2002. Assigned to Air Station Miami, Tom conducted Search and Rescue (SAR) missions as well as drug and migrant interdiction operations. He was then assigned to Air Station New Orleans as a unit instructor pilot and, in 2010, reluctantly left Coast Guard Aviation and was assigned to the USCG Research and Development Center (R&DC) in New London, CT. He was an operational and aviation subject matter expert at R&DC and was tasked to be the Coast Guard’s Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) acquisition project manager. He led that project, testing the efficacy of using UAVs in Coast Operations, as well as a myriad of other long-lead projects that will shape Coast Guard operations well into the future.
Tom is a recently enrolled companion of the New York Commandery and will speak about his long Coast Guard career which, as a USCG helicopter pilot, included rescue operations in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and his being the first Coast Guard helo crew to respond to the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 (for which he and his crew received the Sikorsky Humanitarian Service Award).
Retiring from the Coast Guard in 2014 after 25 years of service, Tom lives in New London, CT with his wife, Anna, a Captain in the U.S. Coast Guard and, as part of its Permanent Commissioned Teaching Staff, a professor in the Department of Management at the USCG Academy. CAPT Hickey’s operational experience included service aboard the USCG high endurance cutters Chase and Munro, as Executive Officer of Tactical Law Enforcement Teams (TACLET), and as Comptroller of Coast Guard Base New Orleans. In May 2024, Anna was handpicked by the Coast Guard Academy’s new Provost to be the next Vice-Provost of Academic Affairs and Chief of Staff for the Academic Division. This is her current position with 28 yrs on active duty.
Tom, who reports that he now spends his spare time unpacking unopened boxes from his twenty-two (22) military moves, is a frequent speaker to various local clubs and organizations.
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