Lockheed EP-3 Orion

Item#: MPLEP3O

MSRP Price: $299.95

Factory Direct Price: $199.95

The P-3V Orion entered the inventory in July 1962, and over 30 years later it remains the Navy's sole land-based antisubmarine warfare aircraft. It has gone through one designation change (P-3V to P-3) and three major models: P-3A, P-3B, and P-3C, the latter being the only one now in active service. The last Navy P-3 came off the production line at the Lockheed plant in April 1990.

NATO's Operation Allied Force marked the combat debut of the P-3C Antisurface Warfare Improvement Program (AIP). The Mediterranean maritime patrol force for these operations included ten P-3Cs, five of the AIP variant, and 14 crews from Patrol Squadrons 1, 4, 5 and 10 from Naval Air Stations Whidbey Island, Barbers Point, Jacksonville and Brunswick, respectively. On March 22, two days before the start of hostilities, P-3C AIP aircraft began flying around-the-clock armed force protection surveillance flights in the Adriatic Sea in direct support of afloat Tomahawk Land Attack Missile (TLAM) shooting ships. For the next 94 days, Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA) provided 100 percent of the Surface Combat Air Patrols (SUCAP) for the USS Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Battle Group and other allied ships operating in the area. This marked the first time surface combat air patrols during actual combat operations have been performed exclusively by non-carrier organic aircraft.

The P-3C Update III Anti-Surface Warfare Improvement Program [AIP] Aircraft will provide improvements in Command, Control, Communications, and Intelligence; surveillance and OTH-T capabilities; and survivability, to include the Maverick Missile System. Delivery of the P-3C Update III Anti-Surface Warfare (ASUW) Improvement Program (AIP) Aircraft to the fleet began 29 April 1998 and is scheduled to be complete at the close of FY00. The P-3C Update III AIP will be accomplished through the retrofit of P-3C Update III Aircraft that have the CP-2044 Digital Data Computer and AN/ALR-66B(V)3 Electronic Support Measures Set installed. Transition to the P-3C Update III AIP Aircraft began in April 1998. Since, as currently envisioned, squadrons will initially operate both the P-3C Update III and P-3C Update III AIP Aircraft, aircrew and maintenance personnel will require training for both aircraft configurations. Training track lengths will increase with the inclusion of the P-3C Update III AIP Aircraft information into existing training tracks.

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