Basler delivers two new BT-67s… but to whom?

January 30, 2025

On 23 January 2025, Basler Turbo Conversions in Oshkosh, Wisconsin delivered the two most recently finished BT-67s (N1350A/MSN 68 and N941AT/MSN 69) to an unknown customer in Tullahoma, Tennessee. Both were finished in overall grey colours without any company or operator markings. This raised speculation that they were destined for a CIA front company.
There are historical links between the nearby Arnold AFB and the CIA, with ARO Inc. (once the operating contractor for the Arnold Engineering Development Centre) being designated as an authorised channel for the receipt and dissemination of foreign intelligence information between national intelligence community agencies and departments.
In Cordova, Tennessee (a suburb of Memphis), a company called Stevens Express Leasing Inc, is the registered owner of another BT-67 (N845S), which is believed to be used for covert CIA or Department of State activities, along with a number of other BT-67s, possibly including N707BA, N1350A, and N272ZZ.
The Basler BT-67 is a turboprop-powered conversion of the veteran Douglas DC-3 (or of the military C-47/Dakota), 69 of which have now been delivered to a variety of customers – Government, military and civilian.
The prototype Douglas Sleeper Transport (DST) first flew on 17 December 1935, making the aircraft we now know as the Dakota or DC-3 90 years old. The DST was a derivative of the DC-2, with a wider fuselage to accommodate side-by-side sleeping births. The DC-2 had made its own debut seven months earlier, on 11 May 1934, entering service with Trans World Airlines just one week later, on 18 May 1934! (The smaller, one-off DC-1 had flown on 1 July 1933).
A version of the DST with 21 seats instead of the DST’s 14–16 sleeping berths was given the DC-3 designation. Early-production civilian DC-3s used either the 9-cylinder Wright R-1820 Cyclone 9 or the 14-cylinder Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp. Douglas built 607 civilian DC-3s before production ended in 1943, but production of the military C-47 Skytrain (known as the Dakota in RAF service) almost all powered by the Twin Wasp, and of Soviet- and Japanese-built versions, brought total production to more than 16,000.
Availability of military surplus C-47s and Dakotas ensured a long post-war career, though numbers have dwindled in recent years, from about 2,000 in 2010 to about 150 today.
Post-war there were a number of attempts to produce turboprop powered versions of the Dakota, the most commercially successful of these being the BT-67, produced by Basler Turbo Conversions in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Basler Turbo Conversions was founded in 1990 and remanufactures and converts existing C-47/DC-3 airframes to BT-67 standards.
The conversion process includes fitting the airframe with new Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6A-67R turboprop engines, lengthening the fuselage, strengthening the airframe to extend its life, upgrading the avionics, and modifying the wing leading edges and wingtips. Basler configures each BT-67 to the client’s specifications, and has produced cargo, military, gunship, cloudseeding, and scientific research aircraft.
Because the PT6A-67R turboprop has higher fuel consumption than the original piston engines fitted to the standard DC-3, range using the standard fuel tank, with 45 minutes reserves, is reduced from 1,160 to 950 nautical miles, though Basler can provide a long-range fuel tank which increases the aircraft range to 2,140 nm.
The two latest BT-67s that left Oshkosh on 23 January 2025 both had long and distinguished histories prior to conversion.
Before its conversion into BT-67 number 68, N1350A started its life as a USAAF TC-47B-30-DK (44-76700) and was delivered in April 1945. After its military service the aircraft was sold to Iberia as EC-ASH in November 1962. Four years later it was sold to the Spanish Ejército del Aire as T.3-63. The aircraft went back into civilian hands in October 1981 when she was sold to Kerns Aircraft Electronics of South Bend, Oregon as N1350A, before going to Professional Flyers Inc, of Wilmington, DE and then Baron Aviation Services Inc.
The second aircraft (BT-67 number 69, N941AT) was a WW II veteran. Originally delivered to the USAAF as 42-93040 on 31 March 1944, she served with the 434th Troop Carrier Group based at Aldermaston, and towed a glider to a landing zone at Hiesville, Normandy, on Mission ‘Keokuk’ on D-Day, 6 June 1944. Post war the aircraft served with Pioneer Airlines as NC54366 before returning to the USAF as C-117C on 1 March 1952. The aircraft was eventually sold to the City of New Orleans Mosquito Control in 1967as N6666A. She went to Air Tejas as N941AT in 1995, flying cargo out of its homebase, Gainesville Municipal Airport. The aircraft was acquired by Basler after storage at Gainesville.