Wings of Youth — The Growth Story of Officers and Soldiers of an Air Force Aviation Regiment Flying Alongside the "Kunpeng"
Wings of Youth — The Growth Story of Officers and Soldiers of an Air Force Aviation Regiment Flying Alongside the "Kunpeng"
■ PLA Daily Correspondents Wang Tonghua, Gao Liying, Li Jianwen
Pilots marching in formation. Photo by PLA Daily correspondent Zhang Lei.
In the morning light, a formation of "Kunpeng" aircraft stands in imposing array. On the vertical tails, the pattern of the Five-Starred Red Flag is especially striking.
Opening the flight tablet computer, post-1990s aircraft commander Lu Qifan swipes his fingertips lightly. In an instant, golden flight tracks across dozens of countries in Asia, Africa, Europe, and Oceania light up at once, converging into a magnificent network on a "digital globe."
Since entering service in 2019, officers and soldiers of an Air Force aviation regiment have traveled alongside the "Kunpeng," measuring out ten thousand li of sky. "From the map of China to the map of the world, from the globe to today's digital globe — over these seven years, we have driven the 'Kunpeng,' roared across the heavens, and our flight tracks have kept extending," said Lu Qifan.
Outside the window, a "Kunpeng" is climbing steeply with a loud roar, echoing the tracks on the screen. Inside the cockpit, young faces radiate confidence. Across ten thousand li of sky, the breath of youth rises like steam.
The wings of the "Kunpeng" are the wings of youth.
This is a young team: a post-1980s regimental commander leads the charge, post-1990s aircraft commanders press forward at the front, and a formation of post-2000s pilots follows close behind — pilots under 30 account for 60 percent of the entire regiment.
These are dazzling flight tracks: from a first flight to the snow-covered plateau just 46 days after entering service, to landing at more than 200 airports worldwide; from rushing to the front lines for disaster relief, to transporting supplies across borders during the pandemic response; from supporting the system through distant-sea patrols, to full-domain delivery of heavy combat forces…
Flying alongside the "Kunpeng," every takeoff and landing, every flight track, is a footnote to the growth of these young officers and soldiers.
Breaking Through: Building the "Kunpeng New Algorithm" (鲲鹏新算法)
The cabin door opens and pilots stride briskly down from the aircraft. The correspondent noticed that the flight bags in their hands were considerably lighter.
"Before, the bag was stuffed with checklists, maps, and plans — very heavy," said post-1990s flight instructor Jin Jian. "Now, one tablet, one water bottle — grab the bag and go."
What the flight bag shed was far more than physical weight; it also shed the inertial thinking in their minds.
The first time he sat in the "Kunpeng" cockpit, facing the LCD displays and hundreds of buttons, Jin Jian was deeply moved: "Going from an old-style transport aircraft to the Y-20, the exponentially growing flow of information felt like a towering cognitive wall."
As the first cohort of pilots in the regiment to transition to the "Kunpeng," Jin Jian and his comrades, under the regiment's leadership, worked through stacks of materials taller than a person. Dozens of key personnel, thousands of flight sorties, tens of thousands of pieces of integrated information… all ultimately condensed into 33 volumes of the Y-20 Pilot Combat Capability Development Series.
When the "basic grammar" of operating the "Kunpeng" had been established, everyone thought they could breathe easy — but then a single remark from the regiment's leadership landed heavily on every mind: "If we don't focus on technological innovation, what defeats us in the future may not be tactics, but algorithms."
Soon, the regiment established the "Kunpeng Wings" Innovation Studio, and frontline flight backbone personnel such as Lu Qifan joined. These are young "wall-breakers" (破壁者), building the "Kunpeng New Algorithm" with code.
"Let people who can fly write the flight code; let people who understand combat write the combat code." In the end, tens of thousands of lines of code, after countless rounds of verification, refinement, and iteration, hatched into the "Kunpeng Wings" Electronic Flight Bag system.
This software suite, custom-built for the "Kunpeng," encompasses more than 20 achievements including the "Kunpeng" Intelligent Examination Software and a Tactical Training Simulation System, integrating automatic route planning, rapid aeronautical chart queries, and precise data calculation.
The soil for innovation grows ever more fertile, and the boundaries of "breaking through" keep expanding.
"A crew must be an all-capable combat team. A lot of data isn't in the manuals — we have to fly it out and feel it out ourselves!" The aviation maintenance battalion proactively collaborated with research institutes and factories to improve the database and streamline response processes, with the goal of building a combat ecosystem of "shared integration and interconnectivity" (共享共融、互联互通).
Faced with the challenge of loading new equipment such as radar vehicles, aerial mechanic Chen Yunfei and his comrades "lived" in the cargo hold conducting repeated trials, producing a Quick Loading Manual and a self-developed intelligent load-planning software. They also innovated a large-crew support model that, with no change in personnel, improved support capability by 40 percent.
The regiment's weekly "brainstorming" sessions often deeply moved veteran pilots. Post-2000s pilot Wang Zihao drew inspiration from VR goggle technology and developed an immersive flight debrief system. Faced with proposals that had yet to take shape, the regiment's leadership had only one response: "If you think it works, try it boldly!"
In the simulation training center, a scale model of a Y-20 engine — whose fan blades spin when powered on — caught the correspondent's attention. From blueprint design to 3D printing, it was completed entirely by post-1990s aircraft commander Wang Hongbin and his comrades. "We don't just fly the 'Kunpeng' well — we can also get our hands on it to make it fly better and generate stronger combat power," said Wang Hongbin.
Upon hearing the regiment's innovation stories, Y-20 chief designer Academician Tang Changhong exclaimed: "The role the 'Kunpeng' plays and the performance it demonstrates in your hands have exceeded my imagination!"
Fission: The Surging "Younger Wave" (后浪)
In a howling wind, a "Kunpeng" tears through the night sky and lands steadily. The cabin door opens and a young aircraft commander steps down.
"His name is Wang Yuhao. He became an aircraft commander at 29, setting a regimental record at the time. But that record will soon be broken by even younger pilots," the regiment's political commissar said, full of pride.
Before the "Kunpeng" entered service, becoming an aircraft commander at 35 was already exceptional; today, young faces have become the main force. Veteran pilots with more than 20 years of experience have found that post-2000s pilots who have just gone solo are already "standing at the same starting line" as themselves.
Pilot Gao Rui transitioned to the Y-20 when he was not yet 23. Today, less than four years after graduation, he has participated in major missions including intercontinental delivery, international rescue, and joint exercises and training, accumulating more than 1,000 flight hours. At the end of last year, he and several comrades from the same cohort were promoted ahead of schedule, skipping a grade to co-pilot, and have entered the aircraft commander candidate cultivation program.
"We are standing on the shoulders of 'giants' — that's why we've grown so fast!" said post-2000s pilot Tao Qiwei. Facing the capability-leap demands brought by the Y-20, the regiment's Party committee keenly recognized the limitations of the traditional "master-apprentice" model. They established multiple specialized research groups, systematically integrated scattered experience, and built a standardized cultivation system in which "the model is replicable, the standards are quantifiable, and the capabilities are transferable" (模式可复制、标准可量化、能力可移植).
Standardization is the foundation of fission; differentiated training became the spark that ignites it. Multi-site dispersed training, rotational group training… efficient training organization models catalyzed a "chain reaction" in capability development.
Pilot Han Jiachen never expected that his first lesson upon arriving at the unit would be "serving as a maintenance soldier." To open up the "governing meridians" (任督二脉) between aircrew and ground crew, the regiment arranged for pilots to move into the aviation maintenance battalion in batches and strictly implement the "five togethers" (五同).
Picking up textbooks to study principles, gripping wrenches to participate in maintenance… returning to the transition front line, Han Jiachen felt different when he touched the aircraft. "Learning operations from the support side, researching technology from the combat side — many doubts suddenly became clear."
Operating a "national heavy weapon" (国之重器) requires a more cutting-edge mind. Under the regimental commander's lead, young pilots' reading lists have grown ever longer: foreign military experience, civil aviation operations and maintenance, safety systems, aerospace, artificial intelligence, big data, psychology, international relations… "Every pilot must strive to become a 'hexagonal warrior' (六边形战士), with enough interfaces built in to integrate into the system," said Wang Yuhao.
The surging "younger wave," accelerating fission in the "reactor" of systematic cultivation. In recent years, the regiment has cultivated more than 20 flight instructors and nearly 30 aircraft commanders; more than 40 crews have achieved full-crew qualification to fly all three variants of the Y-20 series; and individuals honored as Air Force "Advanced Individual in Military Training" and "Outstanding Aviation Maintenance Personnel" have emerged in succession.
On a training day, "Kunpeng" aircraft stand ready to launch. From the control tower, watching the young faces, the regimental commander's face is filled with gratification. Returning from training, this commander spontaneously wrote a calligraphy piece to share with the young pilots: "A journey of a thousand li begins beneath one's feet; a great mountain rises from the finest dust. My path is the same — in walking it, daily renewal is most precious." (千里始足下，高山起微尘。吾道亦如此，行之贵日新。)
Breaking New Ground: The "Medals" of the Pathfinders
On the airfield, a Y-20 with the tail number ending in "1" draws attention.
"In our unit, the number '1' carries a unique meaning," said the regiment's political commissar. "Our team has a dialectic of 1 and 0. Only by daring to break through — only by having this '1' — can there be progress from 1 to 10, and then to 100… We compete to be this pathfinder's '1.'"
To probe the performance boundaries of the "Kunpeng," aircraft commander Zhang Peng flew to a plateau airfield — the runway length was at the theoretical limit, with cliffs on three sides. That night, heavy snow fell suddenly. Fly, or not fly? The aircraft commander made a comprehensive assessment and decided decisively: conditions are met, fly as planned!
Dense fog blanketed the area. The moment the aircraft broke through the clouds, the airfield appeared like a solitary island in a sea of snow. Fierce winds raged; the aircraft pitched like a small boat. Zhang Peng gripped the control column with full force, making corrections, and finally landed steadily. The record of the Y-20 conquering the plateau just 46 days after entering service was thus born.
Breakthrough after breakthrough forged the "medals" of these young pathfinders —
They flew until the fuel warning light came on, determining the extreme range; they landed in strong crosswinds at airfields where civil aviation dared not land, verifying the capability to take off and land in complex meteorological conditions; they "stripped" the cabin bare, testing the maximum takeoff payload…
"These data points, bought with courage, became safety markers for those who came after." Each battle against the sky also drove continuous leaps in the "Kunpeng's" capabilities: faster takeoffs, heavier loads, more precise delivery, stronger support…
In the afternoon, the sun blazes like fire. A "Kunpeng" arrives over the airfield and suddenly executes a rapid dive maneuver… The pilot completing this high-difficulty tactical maneuver is a young aviator who became an aircraft commander not long ago.
"Until a war is actually fought, you never know how large your gaps are. For the sake of winning, we need to make more preparations." The words of flight instructor Zhang Xiaobing are the voice of every officer and soldier in the regiment.
In the winter of 2024, aircraft commander Zhou Han led his crew in flying the "Kunpeng" to South Korea to receive the remains of Chinese People's Volunteer Army martyrs. As the cabin door opened, sleet fell like blades, and the coffins of the martyrs, draped in national flags, were slowly transferred aboard.
On the snow-covered airfield, the Five-Starred Red Flag pattern on the "Kunpeng's" vertical tail blazed like a torch. The smoke of battle from the Chosin Reservoir seemed to cross time and space, reigniting in Zhou Han's heart. "In that moment, I understood more deeply what it means to win. Only by winning can we prove worthy of the victory our forebears forged with their blood and lives. Only by winning can we prove worthy of the hopes our forebears placed in those who came after," Zhou Han said with deep feeling.
Not long ago, to improve delivery effectiveness, the regiment boldly innovated on a particular training subject. This required not only bearing risk but also close coordination with sister units.
"Do you dare to jump?" the regimental commander called the other unit's commander.
"If you dare, we dare!" The reply moved the regimental commander deeply: "As pathfinders, we are not alone!"
The Journey: The "Coordinates" of the Mission
"Will we go there someday?"
In front of the world map in the office of operations staff officer Xu Liang, the discussions of comrades often echo. Those unfamiliar coordinates sketch the outline of these young officers' and soldiers' mission — the journey is still long, the summit still to be climbed.
On the day post-2000s pilot Gao Rui reported for duty, the regiment gave him and the other new pilots a map of China, a map of the world, and a globe. From then on, "coordinates" (经纬度) became a high-frequency word among him and his comrades.
Not long ago, Gao Rui returned to his high school alma mater. A parent at the school gate recognized him: "Aren't you Gao Rui, the pilot who flies the Y-20?!"
The gears of fate mesh precisely in the tide of the era. In 2017, Gao Rui — then a sophomore at a youth aviation school — wrote in his diary: "I want my teachers to see my aircraft, ideally at a military parade."
In the year of the Y-20's first flight, he was still a youth gazing up at the sky; by the time he graduated from the Air Force Aviation University, he had caught the opportunity to be among the first cohort to fly the "Kunpeng" directly.
When he first arrived at the unit, a single remark from the chief of staff — "'The 'Kunpeng's' future is in your hands'" — set Gao Rui's blood boiling: "For the 'Kunpeng' to take flight, a great wind is needed. If you are not even a peng, the wind has nothing to do with you!"
The "Eagle Diary" (雄鹰日记) — Gao Rui has been writing it for nine years. In the thick stack of diaries, the "coordinates" of Gao Rui's youth are marked —
August 1, 2024: He flew the "Kunpeng" back to the city of his alma mater, transporting new flight cadets to report to the Air Force Aviation University. "Senior flying the 'Kunpeng' to pick up juniors" went viral across the internet. He told the new cadets: "Set your sights on the next-generation fighter. The future will surely exceed your imagination."
September 3, 2025: He flew the "Kunpeng" over Tiananmen Square with precision measured in meters and seconds. After sending a screenshot of the review news photo to his high school teacher, the teacher replied: "What a wonderful feeling to see a dream come true!"
Coordinates never personally visited remain forever mere symbols. Tonga, Cairo, Anadyr… only when the "Kunpeng's" flight tracks cover these places do the marks on paper transform into the journey underfoot.
Having flown the "Kunpeng" on multiple cross-border missions, Wang Yuhao said with deep feeling: "Only when you truly fly to that coordinate point does the accumulation of capability find a solid fulcrum."
Post-2000s pilot Liu Jiajun once thought that his overseas exchange study experience in middle school had let him "understand the world." It was not until he flew the "Kunpeng" on nine overseas missions across six countries that his vision truly opened up: "The coordinates of every point are a mission radius that can be reached and must be measured."
Growth is internalizing the mission radius into a spiritual coordinate.
Not long ago, Gao Rui filmed and edited a short video titled "Searching for the 'Kunpeng'" (寻找"鲲鹏"). "There is no need to search far in the Northern Darkness — you and I are both 'Kunpeng.'" The meaning embedded in the video resonated with many comrades.
An alarm tears through the night sky, and another night training session begins. Gao Rui and his comrades grab their flight bags and run toward their aircraft, their figures passing the slogan on the barracks wall: "Train the iron fist to be ready to take off at any time; use the iron fist to be ready to fight at any time." (练铁拳随时能升空，用铁拳随时能战斗。)
The "Kunpeng" roars and leaps into the clouds. Opening the "Global Airport Operations Guide" in the electronic flight bag, this post-2000s pilot's eyes burn with intensity: "I want to fly to the places I've never been!"