For many years two WB-57F Canberras (NASA 926 and NASA 928) were flown and maintained by NASA for high altitude atmospheric research. These same two aircraft have also been deployed alternately to Afghanistan for use as communications platforms that fly high over an area linking various communications devices on the battlefield and to other airborne assets, they were known as the Battlefield Airborne Communications Node system (BACN). In 2011 it was determined that a third aircraft was needed to satisfy mission requirements and an additional WB-57 was removed from the 309th AMARG after over 40 years at Davis-Monthan AFB and returned to flight status in August 2013 as NASA 927.