Tom Amidon

Background

About Tom Amidon

Tom Amidon leads the Safeguards and Security Department as the security director for ORAU and ORISE, and is the facility security officer. In these roles, he oversees the day-to-day safeguards and security functional areas, including information security, personnel security, physical security and 24-hour watch force and protective force activities. Prior to joining ORAU, Amidon worked as a contract special investigator, a role involving conducting interviews, record searches and background checks for national security investigations for government agencies. Amidon has more than 20 years of active duty service in the U.S Army Special Forces and Military Intelligence. He previously served as the training officer and recruiting operations officer for Army ROTC at Carson-Newman University, where he built the ROTC Nursing Program into the largest in the nation. While working in military intelligence, he served as a targeting officer for Special Operations Command Korea. He developed the system for threat analysis used in planning force protection and producing threat briefings that was adopted by the Multi-National Forces and Observers Headquarters in Sinai, Egypt. As a special forces soldier, Amidon served as a weapons sergeant, demolitions sergeant, and intelligence sergeant. He completed a 52-week Defense Language Institute course in Mandarin Chinese. Amidon received his bachelor’s degree in international relations from Campbell University.