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Joseph Bertapelle

Joeseph Bertapelle

This is Bertapelle’s second NAFI Master Instructor accreditation.

Bertapelle owns the Augusta Flight Center (AFC), a flight school at August Municipal Airport in Augusta, Kansas. He arrived in Wichita in late 2006 as a KC-135 navigator for the United States Air Force, going on multiple temporary duties and seven deployments. He became a USAF instructor and evaluator for the navigator schoolhouse, obtaining several squadron and group-level awards. Bertapelle received an honorary discharge from the Air Force in 2012 as a captain for mission-planning software and worked on base as an independent contractor for another seven years to support the KC-135 and the KC-46.

He created Joe Bravo Aviation, LLC to diversify his student base and offer flight instruction to the public. Teaching flight instruction at multiple airports in his spare time, his bolstered reputation afforded him the opportunity to teach at Beechcraft’s Cessna Flying Club, a rare exception to its employee-only stipulation. In 2019, Bertapelle was sought to teach at Flight Safety International in the Caravan G1000 program until 2020 when downsizing from the COVID-19 pandemic furloughed him. Through this seemingly unfortunate circumstance, he has been able to focus his efforts entirely on AFC, becoming its owner in August 2020. It now has a current fleet of 11 planes, ranging from the Cessna 172 through the Beech Sierra. He is checked out in more than 50 different models of GA aircraft and routinely travels to meet students, maintaining a competitive level of expertise, proficiency, and flexibility. He offers instruction of all levels on advanced avionics in aircraft, aerobatic maneuvers, commercial, IFR, tailwheel, and upset training.

Bertapelle has CFI, CFII, MEII, AGI, and remote pilot ratings, and is a Gold Seal Instructor and aircraft dispatcher. He is vice president of the International Aerobatic Club Chapter 119, which recently awarded four aerobatic scholarships to AFC to help students pursue their dreams of aerobatic instruction.