Low tech....

For the win! There is a ‘new’ Skyraider in the military inventory!!!

In recent weeks, in the skies over Iran, we saw the value of high-tech as a force multiplier. American stealth aircraft and smart weapons dealt staggering damage to Iran’s armed forces, to the point that all they have left are a few boats that are essentially water skiing speedboats with machine guns, and a few hundred goblins with AK-47s.

Low-tech played a significant part in this, too. Once air dominance over Iran was established, which took the USA and Israel about six minutes, our A-10 and B-52s were operating with impunity in Iranian airspace, doing what they do best: Dealing with a problem by the suitable application of high explosives.

Speaking of low-tech, the United States Air Force has now taken possession of 18 of their latest low-and-slow close air support birds: The OA-1K Skyraider II.

Full article, HERE from Red State.

While the article gives credit for the new Skyraider to L3Harris, they are actually crop dusters developed by Leland Snow at Air Tractor in Olney, TX about 1 1/2 hours south of us. It’s actually a 2 seat AT-802A crop duster with ‘toys’ added.

Mr. Snow is a legend in the crop dusting world dating to the 1950s, and has also built firefighting birds there, both of initial attack fire fighting, and also dumpers that scoop using floats for more water. Regular crop dusters can operate from rough fields, roads, or anything ‘close’ to where they are spraying, and have very simple spring loaded landing gear.

L3Harris originally developed the ‘toys’ and put them together with an AT-802 to become the Sky Warden, an airborne intelligence platform with a wide array of sensors.

This is a completely different airframe/direction from the Super Tucano by Embraer, HERE. It was originally designed as a basic trainer for Brazil, so it operates from hard surface runways only.

I just wish Mr. Snow and Air Tractor had gotten a little more publicity for what they’ve done. It is truly an inspiring story!