When I say I didn’t want to be an instructor pilot - that’s always a challenge, when you have a dream and you’re not sure how that’s going to work out. What personal or professional hurdles have you overcome during your time in uniform? Now, sure, there’s things going on, but we don’t necessarily hear the stories or get the folks who have been through it. The atmosphere, with that experience being so fresh, it was real. After that, my mentors were pilots that had returned from the Gulf War. ![]() The Gulf War kicked off right after I finished pilot training in 1990. How has training new pilots differed in peacetime and wartime? I’m happy that I get to leave the Air Force where there’s a syllabus that still addresses the fact that we have all this modern technology to work with, but we’re still teaching foundational. This new syllabus - we just started flying on it within the past six months - it’s a little bit of a “back to the basics” approach, which is what I was hoping for. We still produce the same product, we just use many different methods to produce it. We’ve introduced a syllabus that was completely different from the syllabi that we’ve had in the past. What drew you to being an instructor pilot? When I meet a new class, I’ll ask, “Whose mom or dad was in the Air Force?” Surely somebody raises their hand, and our paths have crossed somehow. There’s an instructor pilot here whose dad was a student of mine when I was a first assignment instructor pilot (FAIP). I’ve flown with the sons of fellow pilot training classmates former students. I thoroughly enjoy what I do right now, and the relationship that I can have with these kids. I go out now as more of a father figure, not just to students, but also to my fellow instructor pilots. For every chapter of my life, the airframe I was flying, the students that we’re flying with, they all have their special memories. If you think about flying, or instructing how to fly, from the perspective of a 24-year-old, when I started, versus a 57-year-old - obviously, I’ve matured quite a bit. Is there anything that makes any part of those 10,000 hours stand out? Skies opened up, and then they closed again right after we landed. The day went perfect, other than weather. ![]() Then we had a good dinner with the instructors and the students. I wanted them to be part of that celebration. I wasn’t going to keep it a secret from anybody, but we’re getting pretty close to finishing a class. What went through your head when you hit that mark? I knew that 10,000 would happen, but I’m not, honestly, chasing numbers. Age takes its toll, so I slowed down a little bit as I turned 50, but now here in my last year, I’ve somehow managed to figure out how to pick it back up again. In my younger years, I absolutely flew as much as I possibly could, balancing it with family life. All but my C-130 time has been as an instructor pilot. My whole career, my job has been just to fly airplanes. My dad, who was not a pilot, was a big airplane enthusiast. (Airman 1st Class Christopher Ornelas Jr./Air Force)Īir Force Times: Why did you join the Air Force, and how did you make it to 10,000 flight hours? Volpe achieved this milestone while training a student pilot to fly the T-6A Texan II. Robert Volpe, an instructor pilot in the 5th Flying Training Squadron, celebrates reaching 10,000 flying hours in the Air Force at Vance Air Force Base, Okla., Oct. You can try out some of the community's creations for yourself and see first hand the potential of the War Thunder Community Development Kit below.Lt. ![]() Not only this, but the tools allow you to work and develop your own customized cockpits for either your own aircraft creations, or to use on aircraft in game.Īs well as creating your own content for your own use, you can also share your work with others or download the creations of other players on the War Thunder Live site. The tools provide the option to not only model the 3D aircraft visual model, but create a complex layered system including a damage model with modules as well as fully working features such as landing gear, flaps and more. If you have ever wanted to design your own aircraft 3D models, custom maps, missions and skins, the CDK is an extremely useful tool for putting your own personal work into War Thunder and allowing you to use your creations in game.ģD Aircraft Modeling in the War Thunder CDKĬreating 3D models is one of the most popular functions of the CDK as it allows players to design and create their favorite aircraft and see them fly in the skies of War Thunder. The War Thunder Content Development Kit (CDK) is an official set of tools that allow you to create your own user generated content for use in War Thunder.
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