Beechcraft MC-12W Liberty

Liberty

“An executive turboprop that went to war.”

Beechcraft / L3 · military

Length

46 ft 8 in

Wingspan

57 ft 11 in

Max speed

303 kts

Range

2,670 nmi

Ceiling

35,000 ft

Engines

2x Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6A-60A (1,050 shp each)

Crew

Typical config

2 pilots + 2 sensor operators

Built

The MC-12W Liberty is a Beechcraft King Air 350ER packed with surveillance sensors, rushed into service in 2009 to watch over troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Air Force handed the fleet to the Army, special operations and other government agencies in 2015, and the last special-ops Liberty retired in September 2025 — but King Air ISR airframes are still quietly at work.

Fun fact

The Liberty fleet flew 400,000 combat hours across 79,000 combat sorties in barely six years of Air Force service.

How to spot one

A military-gray King Air 350 with a sensor ball under the belly and antennas along the spine. Easily mistaken for a commuter plane until you spot the turret.

Sounds like

Twin PT6A turboprops — the familiar King Air buzz. Nothing about the sound says surveillance aircraft, which was the point

One might be overhead right now.

Bogey turns the Liberty from a dot in the sky into a card in your logbook.