De Havilland Canada DHC-5 Buffalo

The DHC-5 Buffalo is a short takeoff and landing utility transport turboprop aircraft developed from the piston-powered DHC-4 Caribou and designed by de Havilland Canada. It grew out of a 1962 United States Army requirement for a STOL transport able to carry the same payload as the CH-47A Chinook helicopter. De Havilland Canada enlarged the Caribou and fitted General Electric T64 turboprops in place of its Pratt & Whitney R-2000 piston engines. The design won the Army competition in early 1963, four aircraft were ordered under the designation YAC-2, later CV-7A and then C-8A, and the first flew on 9 April 1964. All four were delivered in 1965, carrying nearly twice the payload of the Caribou with better STOL performance. Production of the DHC-5A ended in 1972 and restarted with the DHC-5D in 1974, which ended in December 1986.