On August 1, 2022, the American corporation L3Harris announced that the United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), as part of its Armed Overwatch program, selected the AT-802U Sky Warden turboprop reconnaissance and strike aircraft presented jointly by L3Harris and Air Tractor for procurement. As part of the Armed Overwatch program, 75 manned reconnaissance and strike aircraft are planned to be purchased for USSOCOM.
A prototype demonstrator of the L3Harris / Air Tractor AT-802U Sky Warden turboprop reconnaissance and strike aircraft selected by the US Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) for procurement under the Armed Overwatch (c) L3Harris program
L3Harris, as the lead contractor, received a USSOCOM framework contract worth $ 3 billion for a formally unspecified number of AT-802U Sky Warden aircraft (in fact, apparently covering the purchase of 75 planned machines), including a firm contract worth $ 170 million for the supply of six first-series aircraft (Lot 1).
L3Harris and Air Tractor Company presented a demonstrator of the AT-802U Sky Warden turboprop reconnaissance and strike aircraft, which is a new version of the well-known Air Tractor AT-802U reconnaissance and strike aircraft (based on the AT-802 agricultural aircraft), in May 2021. As you can see, the AT-802U Sky Warden was designed specifically for participation in the Armed Overwatch USSOCOM program. L3Harris provided optoelectronic equipment and communication systems for the aircraft and is responsible for overall integration.
The Armed Overwatch program, announced in early 2020, required the purchase of 75 aircraft for use in "unconventional" combat operations. Such an aircraft, according to the requirements, must provide direct air support, pinpoint strikes, "armed reconnaissance", reconnaissance and surveillance, strike coordination and advanced aviation. At the same time, such an aircraft should provide support primarily to small groups of special operations forces, and not "mass troops".
Although up to 50 companies with a wide variety of offers initially announced their participation in the Armed Overwatch program competition, however, in May 2021, USSOCOM selected five applicants, issuing contracts totaling $ 19.1 million to the companies that submitted them for the manufacture of one prototype demonstrator. These were the proposals of Leidos / Paramount USA / Vertex Aerospace Bronco II (based on the AHRLAC turboprop aircraft of the Paramount South African group), MAG Aerospace MC-208 Guardian (based on the Cessna 208B Caravan aircraft), Beechcraft AT-6E Wolverine (a variant of the T-6 Texan II turboprop training aircraft), Sierra Nevada Corporation MC-145B Wily Coyote (a variant of the Polish twin-engine turboprop light transport aircraft PZL M28) and turboprop reconnaissance and strike aircraft L3Harris / Air Tractor AT-802U Sky Warden. In October 2021, the Bronco II and MC-208 Guardian dropped out of the final stage, and as a result, the AT-802U Sky Warden was now selected.
L3Harris has now announced that it expects to quickly modify the AT-802U Sky Warden demonstration prototype for Armed Overwatch, presented in 2021, to a serial configuration and provide it to USSOCOM for testing the weapons complex in about six months. Production of the ordered six new AT-802U Sky Warden aircraft in serial configuration will begin in 2023 - the aircraft will be manufactured at the Air Tractor plant in Olney (Texas) and then retrofitted into the AT-802U Sky Warden variant at the L3Harris production center in Tulsa (Oklahoma).
From the bmpd side, we will point out that the AT-802U Sky Warden aircraft, now selected by the US Special Operations Command, is a development of a fairly long line of reconnaissance, strike and counter-insurgency aircraft based on the popular AT-802 turboprop agricultural aircraft of the Air Tractor company. Recall that the first sample of the Air Tractor AT-802U anti-station aircraft (Block 1 and 2) was developed in the 2000s by Air Tractor in partnership with the American company Iomax, which was responsible for creating a complex of weapons and electronic equipment. Under a number of contracts concluded since 2009, AT-802U aircraft were supplied to the UAE (38 aircraft, later 12 of them were transferred to Egypt by the UAE and six to Jordan).
However, later Air Tractor and Iomax came into conflict, and since 2013 Iomax has developed its own version of the Archangel Border Patrol Aircraft (BPA) Block 3 reconnaissance and strike aircraft based on the Thrush 710P turboprop aircraft competing with Air Tractor manufacturer of agricultural aviation - Thrush Aircraft company from Albany (Georgia), delivering 24 such aircraft for the same UAE.
In turn, Air Tractor, in order to continue the implementation of combat variants of the AT-802, turned to the L-3 Communicatio Corporation (now L3Harris), which developed its own complex of weapons and electronic means for this machine, with which the aircraft was offered to the market as AT-802L Longsword. The United States planned to deliver 12 AT-802L aircraft to Kenya and ten to Yemen under military assistance programs, but for political reasons this was not implemented, and four AT-802L aircraft already manufactured for Yemen were transferred to Jordan in 2017. The AT-802U Sky Warden became a further development of AT-802L already for USSOCOM
