The deployment of the one-of-a-kind 737 to MacDill Air Pressure Base, Florida, to help the Artemis II launch, supplied plane spotters and photographers with an unprecedented alternative for a more in-depth have a look at the NT-43A “RAT 55” and its dorsal EO/IR turret.
As we reported intimately yesterday, the highly-modified Boeing 737-200, the U.S. Air Pressure NT-43A, higher identified with its callsign RAT55 (or RATT 55), was among the many belongings working round Cape Canaveral to help the Artemis II launch on Apr. 1, 2026.
Each on the day of the launch and the day previous to that (when a rehearsal was carried out), the plane, often employed as Radar Airborne Testbed (RAT) and believed for use virtually solely to judge the radar signatures of stealthy plane, flew from MacDill Air Pressure Base, Florida, and operated to the north of the launch pad, in an airspace reserved by NOTAM 03/643 (KZMA-A1035/26):
!CARF 03/643 ZMA AIRSPACE DCC EROP K0949 WINDOWABC SUPT STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN AREA DEFINED AS 285000N0804700W TO 290400N0792900W TO 292800N0793400W TO 291500N0810100W TO POINT OF ORIGIN FL200-FL350 2604012125-2604020105
Apparently, the plane didn’t use its regular callsign, however a NASA one (NASA 522), and was additionally seen on flight monitoring web sites together with the opposite plane observing the launch, reminiscent of one of many company’s well-known WB-57 Canberra high-altitude analysis plane, N926NA.
#AE654A as #NASA522/#RATT55 #ACD5A1 as #N926NA
NT-43A tail quantity 73-1155 getting in to place together with one of many WB-57s tail quantity N926NA to help the launch of Artemis II. Simply stunning! pic.twitter.com/Eruu82tjTS
— Norb (@norb420) April 1, 2026
As we had speculated by connecting all of the dots, the plane was certainly performing data-collection duties for the Artemis II launch, because the U.S. Air Pressure confirmed to TWZ, though the precise scope and particulars of this new function are nonetheless unclear. Typically talking, the mission itself is just not new, because the U.S. Air Pressure beforehand operated one other asset devoted to supplementing land- and sea-based monitoring stations and protecting telemetry gaps: the EC-135 Apollo/Vary Instrumentation Plane (A/RIA), which later grew to become the Superior Vary Instrumentation Plane (ARIA).
In an article about ARIA, that you could find right here, we defined:
Through the Apollo missions, ARIAs would fly the place they had been wanted, and would obtain and report the telemetry knowledge of the spacecraft on magnetic tape recorders. Along with this, they had been additionally used as a receiving and transmitting base for verbal capsule communications between Houston and the spacecraft. The recorded telemetry knowledge may both be held for publish mission evaluation, or may even be re-transmitted over completely different bands in actual time.
Due to the plane’s mission top quality photos of RATT55 are considerably unusual and often solely seem when the jet makes journeys exterior of the Nevada Check and Coaching Vary (NTTR).
Noteworthy, for the NASA Artemis II help mission, the NT-43A was fitted once more with a detachable dorsal enclosure and Electro-Optical/Infra-Purple turret, which had been noticed in different images of the plane taken from distance. The highest “humps” are certainly clearly seen within the photos taken by photographer Tim Stevenson at MacDill AFB who despatched us the photographs that you could find on this article.
The presence of the dorsal EO/IR turret (complementing these already put in above the 2 foremost radomes) could counsel the info assortment carried out by the extremely secretive plane, often working out of Tonopah Check Vary Airport (TTR) or Space 51 in Nevada, included an optical monitoring part as nicely, probably permitting the plane not solely to collect telemetry knowledge but in addition to visually monitor and report elements of the mission profile, particularly in the course of the ascent part (presumably to enhance the imagery collected by the WB-57’s electro-optical and infrared sensors), very like airborne vary instrumentation belongings used up to now to complement ground- and sea-based monitoring protection.
For the information, the dorsal enclosure was not put in on RATT55 when it was noticed working with a B-2 in August 2025.
RAT55 working with a B2 #rat55 #b2 #ratt55 pic.twitter.com/mezwJKtJd8
— Julian Elnasser (@LAXSPOTTER97) Might 28, 2025
As defined in different tales concerning the secretive RAT55, the T-43, based mostly on the Boeing 737-200, was beforehand a comparatively widespread airframe within the U.S. army, serving as coaching plane after which in a restricted capability for govt transport, however the distinctive NT-43A is the one such instance nonetheless in service. Different 737s in U.S. service are of the extra trendy 737 NG or ‘Subsequent Technology’ household, even together with people who function as a part of Space 51’s ‘Janet’ fleet. Whereas substitute of this ageing airframe would appear overdue, the continued modifications to the jet and the brand new function in NASA help greater than ever counsel its time is just not but at an finish.
