AC-130A Gunship
Hercules or Spectre ??

The Lockheed AC-130 (see:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_AC-130) gunship is a heavily armed, long-endurance ground-attack variant of the C-130 Hercules, transport fixed-wing aircraft.
See:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_C-130_Hercules)
It carries a wide array of anti-ground oriented weapons that are integrated with sophisticated sensors, navigation, and fire-control systems. The airframe is manufactured by Lockheed Martin,
while Boeing is responsible for the conversion into a gunship and for aircraft support.

The AC-130A "Spectre" is a C-130 that was converted to a side-firing gunship, primarily for night attacks against ground targets.
In addition to its armament, it also possessed sensors, a target acquisition system,
and a forward looking infra-red (FLIR) and lowlight television system.
The high-wing design of this aircraft and its large capacity made it especially suited as a gunship.
The first gunship, the AC-47, with low wings, reduced its field of fire. Having the guns below the wings eliminated the basic problem of the AC-47.

The A-model gunship was the first AC-130 model.
The aircraft is 97 feet 9 inches long and 38 feet 3 inches tall. It has a wingspan of 132 feet 7 inches and a wing area of 1,745 sq. feet. Initially, the C-130 had a maximum speed of 384 mph and an unrefueled range of 2,450 miles with maximum load.
However, with the aerial refueling modification, the range for the later model gunships was only limited by crew endurance.

The AC-130, having been derived from the armed AC-47 gunship series, saw extensive and successful action against enemy forces in the Vietnam War.
Compared to the AC-47D, the AC-130A "Spectre" gunship was equipped with more and bigger guns --
four MXU-470 7.62mm miniguns and four M61A1 20mm cannons.
The AC-130A was also equipped with a 20 kilowatt(1.5 million candlepower) illuminator and a flare launcher

The AC-130 gunship first arrived in South Vietnam on 21 September 1967 under the Gunship II program,
and began combat operations over Laos and South Vietnam that year.
By December 1968 most AC-130s were flown under F-4 Phantom II escort from the 479th Tactical Fighter Squadron,
normally three Phantoms per gunship.

By 2018, AC-130 gunships will have been providing close air support for special operators for 50 years.
Although the aircraft have been kept relevant through constant upgrades to their weaponry, sensor packages, and countermeasures,
they are not expected to be survivable in future non-permissive environments due to their high signatures and low airspeeds.

Whew!! She's a Beast!