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Air Tractor dominates Airventure 2019

Olney local business Air Tractor recently attended Air-Venture in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. The company that is famous for building high-quality AT-502B and AT-802F planes among other aircraft stole the show with a dominant performance from the AT-802F, which is shown in a recent video posted on the Olney Enterprise and Air Tractor Facebook pages.

A popular aircraft, the AT-802A in the photo on Page 8, was just sold to Mike Hall of Missouri. These planes are used and sold all over the world. Some of the dealer locations are Australia, Spain, South Africa, Spain and South America.

According to AirTractor.com, Leland Snow designed his first Ag airplane, the S-1, in 1951. The 23-year-old Snow completed test flights with the S-1 in 1953. He flew the S-1 on dusting and spraying jobs in the Texas Rio Grande Valley and Nicaragua until 1957. The next year, Snow moved his aircraft production activities to Olney, Texas where he established The Snow Aeronautical Company. In his new manufacturing facilities, he began building the models S-2A and S-2B airplanes.

In 1965, Leland Snow sold his company to Rockwell-Standard and became a vice president of the Aero Commander division. During his time at Rockwell-Standard, the Model S-2R was developed and named the Thrush. The first 100 Thrush aircraft were built at the Olney Division. Then the entirety of Thrush aircraft production was moved to Georgia in 1970. In all, more than 500 Snow Aeronautical planes were produced and thousands of Snow designed planes were produced.

Snow resigned from Rockwell in 1970 and devoted the next two years designing the first Air Tractor. It was to be an improved, modern ag plane with a sleek, aerodynamically efficient airframe. Construction began in 1972 on the Air Tractor AT-300, which later became the AT-301. Air Tractor’s first turbine model, the AT-302, was introduced in 1977.

Air Tractor is now owned by the employees and is known all over the world for their high-quality planes. For more information, please visit AirTractor.com