Air Tractor, L3Harris reveal Sky Warden ISR and light strike aircraft

Air Tractor and L3Harris Technologies have revealed their latest intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and light strike platform, dubbed the AT-802U Sky Warden.

Announced on 6 May, the Sky Warden is based on the AT-802 crop duster airframe manufactured by Air Tractor, with mission systems supplied and integrated by L3Harris Technologies.

“Sky Warden is based on the rugged and capable Air Tractor AT-802, which features the largest payload capacity of any single engine turboprop aircraft. It hosts L3Harris’ world-class family of communications, sensors and airborne ISR solutions,” L3Harris Technologies said. “The platform is backed by the company’s extensive turnkey ISR operation experience.”

The AT-802U Sky Warden is the latest offering from Air Tractor and L3Harris of an ISR and light strike aircraft based on the AT-802 crop duster airframe.

Having previously provided AT-802 airframes to IOMAX for that company’s AT-802i contract with the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Air Tractor in 2009 launched its own AT-802U platform as both the airframer and the systems integrator (this was known colloquially as ‘the Air Tractor’). In 2017 Air Tractor revealed that, while it was still developing and marketing its own AT-802U, it had teamed with systems integrator L3 Communications, as the company was then known, on a new version of the AT-802U known as the AT-802L Longsword (and briefly as the OA-8 Longsword).

Air Tractor had previously sold four of its original AT-802Us to Jordan (these were originally slated for Yemen, but diverted when the political situation in that country deteriorated), while the AT-802L was approved for sale to Kenya (though approved in 2017, no deliveries have been made).