Aircraft 81-0896
In 1981 the United States Air Force bought eight American Airlines Boeing 707-320C aircraft at a cost of around 1.5 million dollars each with the initial intent to modify four of these aircraft to replace four of the aging EC-135N ARIA Aircraft. 81-0896 was modified for use as a test bed for the SMILS/Optics program.
After the ARIA mission was completed 81-0896 was converted for the JSTARS mission as 02-9111.
Source: Randy L. Losey