Tom Cocchiaro was born in Tachikawa, Japan to American military parents and currently lives with his wife Annabelle in the seaside port of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He has always been fascinated with all-things space and was probably NASA's worse nightmare as a child; constantly writing in for the newest poster or handout on the space missions of the day. His astronomy interest took off one year after getting a 60x Tasco telescope for Christmas and has never waned since. It wasn't long after that he graduated high school and started a 20-year career in the Air Force, initially as an avionics technician and then as a public affairs specialist. As one of his first assignments in the PR field, he was assigned to cover the first landing of the Space Shuttle Columbia as a reporter for the installation newspaper. He had the life-changing privilege of interviewing shuttle astronauts.