Life is chock full of change. Many people get stuck in careers and jobs they come to hate. Thomas Cole is an outlier. He has two jobs. He loves and thrives in both …. and his work is not done.
But that does not negate change. He’s going through that now in each career.
After 21 years and two days at the Knoxville Fire Department (KFD), Capt. Thomas Cole, 44, is now an assistant chief, promoted on May 14, 2026. Big change. He will be working at Station 18 on Weisgarber Road with Blue Shift, Battalion 3 responsibility over Station 18 and three other West Knoxville firehalls – 12, 20, and 21.
His second career is with the 134th Air Refueling Wing at McGhee Tyson Air Base, flying in KC-135 Stratotankers. He is a Chief Master Sergeant, and only 1% of the Air Force’s enlisted structure holds that rank. For 18 of his 25 years with the 134th, he has been a boom operator, lying flat at the open end of a KC-135, positioning the 45-foot jet fuel boom to refuel fighter jets and other aircraft. It is a process, he says, he’s completed “thousands of times.”
Chief Master Sgt. Thomas Cole of the 134th Refueling Wing is positioning the fuel boom into place at the rear of the KC-135 for a Navy F-35 fighter jet at around 20,000 feet over the Pacific Ocean
His “change” in the 134th came on Jan. 18, 2026, when his flying days ended because of what is known as a “boom neck.”
Cole’s dual careers — one serving his community, the other serving the country – is why he is “Our Town Hero” today.
The thousands of times he’s handled the boom is why that job has ended. “My neck can’t take it any longer, and I can’t fly again. I have two discs at the top of my spine that are gone, inflamed ligaments and nerves, and a cyst on my spine,” he explains. “I have facet joints messed up, and this all started in 2019. It’s really affected the right side of my body.”
He’s planning to retire in the next 12 to 18 months and will eventually face cervical spine surgery. “I’ll need surgery 100%, but my neurosurgeon wants me to wait until I’m close to 60, and he says I’ll need two fusion surgeries.”
No more flying is a very bittersweet pill for him. “More than anything I’ll miss the men and women I flew with. I’ll miss the views from the boom pod and the cockpit and the sense of camaraderie with a very small group of people. After every refueling mission, I always reflected on what we accomplished,” he says. “We just got two jets close enough to not only touch but to transfer fuel, extending the tactical range of that jet, keeping them in the fight, and I was the hinge pin in that process. It’s humbling to think about.”
Thomas Cole leads the KFD team in last year’s Knoxville Marathon
His approach to both jobs is simple. “I really don’t feel like I work. Every opportunity that I’ve had, I have taken it and done OK. Graduating from high school was my first goal, and I did that (Karns High, class of 2000) when no one else in my family did,” he says. “I worked as a brick mason and didn’t much like that. I even went to Tennessee Tech and left after a week. Not for me.”
Saying he was “desperate to survive” and find a job, he joined the Air Force on Jan. 30, 2001. “I don’t do 9-to-5 jobs very well, and I enjoy something different every day, and both jobs provide that for me.”
He has more than 4,000 hours of flying time and has been deployed 16 times – 12 to the Middle East, including Iran and Afghanistan – and several to the Pacific. His last deployment, which ended in January, was for five months to Guam, Japan, South Korea, Diego Garcia, Wake Island, Singapore, Hawaii, and Alaska.
Cole did share a few interesting things about his job:
- The KC-135 jets have a crew of just three – pilot, co-pilot and boom operator.
- His right-hand control stick flies the boom into position to the jets and his left extracts the boom.
- Once the boom is locked into place, a co-pilot in the cockpit begins the fuel flow.
- Each KC-135 carries 200,000 pounds of jet fuel.
- It takes between 5 and 15 minutes to refuel an F-16 and 20 minutes for the F-15 Eagle and F-22 Raptor jets. Refueling a big cargo jet takes 30 minutes.
Interestingly, he’s never suffered an injury in his KFD years. Many firefighters are not that lucky.
One KFD call in 2019 sticks with him. It happened in Fort Sanders on Seventeenth Street at the 17th Street Market & Deli, a neighborhood store. A man, 21, was trapped inside a ventilation duct for several hours. The young man died four days after Cole and other firefighters extricated him from above the kitchen stove top. First responders found him after people heard his screams.
“I was on the roof talking with him,” Cole recalled. “He was stuck legs up and covered in exhaust grease. We did everything we could to get him out. He suffered what is known as Acute Compartment Syndrome. His body was basically crushed. He was squeezed in that vent really tight. At some point he stopped talking with me and started hallucinating for about 30 minutes. Then he passed out.”
This KFD veteran shares a few other observations about the fire business today.
- “In my career the biggest change is technology. The gear we wear now is very advanced. The trucks are full of computer technology to help us. Many of the manual controls are gone. The rescue tools are lighter, operated by batteries. We have drones overhead. Plus automatic pumping.”
- “Fires are more toxic and hotter because of the plastic and synthetic materials used in furniture, appliances, carpeting, and even wall coverings. It’s gotten more dangerous.”
- “Today’s younger people we hire are very different from my generation and those before me. They respond differently to criticism and discipline. They train differently and have different expectations. They won’t work here for 30 years. They work four or five years and they move on.”
Cole, a native of Columbia, MD, is the oldest of six brothers. He and his ex-wife share two children. Daughter Caelin, 23, is a graduate of Maryville College, now studying to be a Physician’s Assistant. Son Isaac is 18, a recent graduate of Central High School, and will attend the University of Tennessee next fall with a goal of becoming a lawyer.
He studied at the Community College of the Air Force and earned an
Associate’s degree in Aviation/Airway Management and Operations.
He balances the stresses of both careers by spending time decompressing at the gym three days a week—lifting weights, working out, and running. He also hunts deer, elk, and turkey. “I love to be on a deer stand and watching the world wake up. I love being outside.” He also heads up the KFD team that runs in the Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon. The next race will be the 20th anniversary and will be held on Sunday, April 11, 2027.
His next challenge comes on July 16 when he checks into the Knoxville Spine Surgery Center for a left side cervical spine ablation to hopefully relieve a lot of his Boom Neck pain at Levels 3, 4 and 5. He also has some right-arm and left shoulder neuropathy now. “We’re hoping this also will dissolve the cyst I have on my spine,” Cole said.
Three days later, he’s planning to be at work at Station 18. It’s hard to keep an Air Force guy “down” for long!
Tom King has been the editor of newspapers in Texas and California, and also worked in Tennessee and Georgia. If you have someone you think we should consider featuring, please email Tom at the link with his name or text him at 865-659-3562.
Aubrey’s Restaurants sponsors Our Town Hero.
