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Science & Technology
Army To Retire All Of Its Turboprop Surveillance Planes By The End Of The Year
2025-06-05
[TWZ] The U.S. Army says it is on schedule to retire the last of its turboprop-powered intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) aircraft by the end of this year. Prior to the start of these divestments in 2022, the service had dozens of crewed turboprop ISR planes spread across units in the United States and forward deployed overseas. There continues to be questions about forthcoming capability and capacity gaps, with business jet-based replacement aircraft still years away from entering service and recent reports that the Army could ultimately buy just six of them.

"The divesture of the AISR [aerial ISR] legacy fleet is ongoing and will continue throughout 2025," a spokesperson for the Army’s Program Executive Office for Aviation (PEO-A) confirmed to TWZ. "The RC-12X, MC-12, and EO-5 fleets will be divested by the end of 2025. The divestment of the legacy AISR fleet has been ongoing since 2022."

The RC-12X, also known as the Guardrail Common Sensor (GRCS), is a twin-engine Beechcraft King Air-based ISR aircraft equipped with a signals intelligence (SIGINT) package and a ventral sensor turret with electro-optical and infrared full-motion video cameras. The RC-12X is the latest in a line of Guardrail variants with steadily improving capabilities, the first of which entered service in the 1970s and were staples during the Cold War. Prior to 2022, the Army had 14 GRCS aircraft, plus five RC-12X(T) pilot trainers with no sensors fitted.

Aircraft in the graphic is not an RC-12 but rather a Shorts-360 deployed to Iraq in 2009 to conduct 'persistent surveillance' in support of the counter-IED mission.



Posted by:Besoeker

#7  Possibly less expensive to contract it out or use drones.

Different color of money.
Leased services vs. airframe operations and maintenance.

Posted by: Skidmark   2025-06-05 09:52  

#6  Reserve Crazy Hawk C-12's used to fly out of Orlando. Kept an eye on Cuba when tasked, sometimes when not tasked. Mostly Viet vet pilots and backseaters.
Posted by: Besoeker   2025-06-05 08:11  

#5  ...We see a GUARDRAIL about once every two weeks, shooting touch-and-goes at Columbia Regional. It's fun watching people's faces when I tell them what it can do. (low, mildly evil chuckle).

Mike
Posted by: MikeKozlowski   2025-06-05 06:28  

#4  Possibly less expensive to contract it out or use drones.
Posted by: Besoeker   2025-06-05 06:16  

#3  Really nice looking aircraft. And Dear Army, why is there an apparent gap between now and what works, and the when of this aircraft's jet replacement? The tyranny of "the schedule"? Do better, please.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike   2025-06-05 05:59  

#2  A Closer Look at The Beechcraft King Air 350 ISR Aircraft
Posted by: Skidmark   2025-06-05 00:27  

#1  L3 - FAMILY OF KING AIR ISR AIRCRAFT
Posted by: Skidmark   2025-06-05 00:25  

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