Lockheed P-3 Orion (16-2317)

When was this shot taken? I thought the Navy retired the P-3 years ago??

Yesterday. And I don't think so, we get them in TLH quite often.. Along with the new P-8

Dave Sheehy, the P-3Cs are still flying, but not for much longer. The "Summer 2015" edition of NAVAL AVIATION NEWS (being distributed this week) has a farewell article about them ("Navy Says Goodbye to Sunsetting P-3C Orion") on page 40. The VP 26 "Tridents" are "... currently flying missions in the US Fifth Fleet, the Navy's final East Coast active duty deployment of the P-3C".
I was stoked when I caught one flying right over my house about 6 months ago. My wife saw it first, but she glimpsed it early enough that I was able to grab my camera from inside the house and get two clean caps of it right overhead.
Gonna miss them.
Excellent snap here, David. Straight five.

Thanks Gary! And yeah, we are going to miss them in Tallahassee too.. We are quite fortunate here, we get a nice mix of military aircraft from all over the southeast and tons of training aircraft from NAS Pensacola and Ft. Rucker. A nice perk to the job!

One of my high school and USNA classmates is a P-3 NFO. I'll have to ask if he's transitioning to P-8s or if he's going to remain ashore.