Sun 'n Fun 2015 - P-8 Poseidon
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| This P-8 Poseidon -- the U.S. Navy's new maritime patrol aircraft -- landed and taxiied by Homebuilt Camping. I was pretty excited about it as I spent quite a bit of time in the airplane the P-8 is replacing: the mighty P-3 Orion. |
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Later, we checked out the P-8 parked on the ramp. I looked for but could not find any squadron markings on the airplane.
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| Type and bureau number. |
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No Mad boom protruding from the tail like the P-3 but some funky looking sensors instead.
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| The next day we discovered they were letting people go on board the P-8 so of course I had to go check it out. The P-8 crew were from VP-30 so this is a RAG bird. |
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| Looking down the aircraft from the top of the forward ladder, which is much sturdier than what the P-3 had. Plus the P-8 has two of them instead of just one. |
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| Looking out over Sun 'N Fun from the P-8. |
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Just inside the forward door. I was surprised visitors were allowed inside the aircraft but a crewmember explained that there was nothing classified to see.
I neglected to take a picture of the cockpit. It looked very modern -- all glass. But I can't even tell you if they still have a Flight Engineer anymore. The P-8 does not have two bunks aft like the P-3. Instead, they have these two chairs forward that fully recline for the off-duty pilots to get some sleep on long missions.
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| The P-8 basically follows the same crew concept of the P-3: a Tactical Coordinator, Nav-Com, two accoustic sensor operators and one non-acoustic sensor operator. But on the P-8 they all sit side by side at identical stations. What is displayed on the monitors is interchangeable. So crew coordination and information exchange is much better. On the negative side, the Tacco and Nav/Com no longer have a big window to look out of. The seats to the left are for extra crewmembers or passengers who used to sit on the floor between two bays in the P-3. |
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The P-8 does not carry sonobuoys externally like the P-3. All sonobuoys are carried internally and launched from that rotating cylinder device. Plus there are some free fall chutes.
I really enjoyed touring the P-8 and talking with the crew, who were sharp and impressive.
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