The US Air Force plane that just crash-landed in a field was a new special ops attack aircraft converted from a crop duster

• A US Air Force special ops plane converted from a crop duster crashed in Oklahoma yesterday.

• No accidents have been reported amongst the crew, which included an Air Force energetic responsibility personnel and a civilian.

• The OA-1K Skyraider II is an armed ISR aircraft with close-air assist and strike capabilities.

The US Air Force plane that crashed into a field in Oklahoma late Thursday afternoon was a new special operations gentle attack aircraft that the service first obtained earlier this 12 months.

The new OA-1K Skyraider II is a militarized model of the well-known Air Tractor AT-802, which is used for agricultural work like crop dusting, or aerial software of pesticides or fertilizer. The Air Force plane helps missions like close air assist and armed intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance.

The crash occurred Thursday afternoon in southeast Oklahoma City, according to the Oklahoma Air National Guard. The aircraft and crew have been assigned to the 492nd Special Operations Wing out of Will Rogers Air National Guard Base. No accidents have been reported among the 2 people on board, and the trigger of the crash is under investigation.

Oklahoma City Fire Department officers told local news media that the aircraft appeared to have suffered some variety of engine failure and that the crew tried to convey the aircraft down in a secure space, in this case, a field.

The crew included one civilian and one active-duty airman. At the time of the incident, the plane was on a training flight.

The OA-1K Skyraider II was unveiled to the public for the first time in early May at SOF Week 2025 in Tampa, Florida, where Business Insider acquired an up-close look at the new plane. The first mission-ready Skyraider II aircraft had been delivered to Air Force Special Operations Command just prior to that event.

While the plane began as a crop duster, the OA-1K Skyraider II — named after the A-1 Skyraider of the Korean and Vietnam wars — has obtained a ton of upgrades for a selection of missions, such as CAS, armed ISR, and strike. Different applied sciences may be simply built-in into the modular aircraft design for different missions.

Made by L3Harris, the OA-1K Skyraider II has been described by the Air Force as a versatile aircraft that boasts more manageable upkeep calls for and a decrease value per flight hour than other AFSOC aircraft at less than $1,000 per hour.

It was mainly constructed for armed overwatch and attack in permissive environments. L3Harris officers beforehand told Business Insider one of the aircraft’s strengths is that it could actually land just about “anywhere,” from rugged and distant airfields to highways.

The Air Force has been prioritizing that flexibility for higher-end warfare in which fixed bases and airfields are weak targets for a well-armed adversary like China or Russia. More austere environments and unconventional runways are less probably to appeal to enemy missiles.

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