The Civil Air Patrol is made up of volunteers who step up and take off to help during search and rescues across the United States.

They also train cadets. Members took cadets on orientation flights in Rome on Sunday.

"Basically just showing us, if we have an interest in flight, how to do things and how things work," said Vincenzo Perfetti, a Civil Air Patrol cadet.

The Civil Air Patrol is the auxiliary of the United States Air Force, and offers a cadet program.

Perfetti has been with the program for about a year. He's thinking about being a pilot one day.

"My dad was in the Navy so we always joke at home about the Navy or Air Force,” Perfetti said. “So I think either one of the two would be fine.”

In the year-round program, Cadets fly, learn to lead, hike, and camp among other things.
It's helpful experience but down the road flight training can be expensive. So the Civil Air Patrol offers scholarships, of which Felice Rucci of Rochester is a recipient and is now in the Cadet Wings program.

"I stepped off a plane in Washington when I was like 7 years old, Rucci said. “And that moment when you take off the ground, it just clicks, it's like a magic moment that this is what I want to do for the rest of my life.”

Rucci said he appreciates how the Civil Air Patrol programs prepare and push cadets.

"Intense training but it pays off in the end," Rucci said. "You learn a common motto in the aviation industry, 'you never stop learning'. There's airline pilots still learning something new every day. It's just a constant building upon yourself to make yourself a better pilot, a safer pilot, and a happier life."

Cadets must be 12 to 18 years old.

For more information about the Youth in Cadet Program, click here.

A special thanks to Civil Air Patrol Lieutenant Colonel Dean Anderson and Captain Keith James for taking Spectrum News 1's Melissa Krull up in the plane.