A Cold War classic!
Official caption: “4 March 1970. U.S. Navy anti-submarine warfare aircraft P-3A Orion, from the “Mad Foxes” of Patrol Squadron FIVE (VP-5), she flies in the vicinity of the Soviet helicopter carrier ship Moskva (841). The number designation roughly fits with the date of this photograph. She was primarily an anti-submarine warfare ship.”
Photographed by PHC Daniels S. Dodd, National Archives photograph: USN 1143794. NHHC Photograph Collection, L-File, Aviation, P-3.
Dubbed a helicopter cruiser (kreyser-vertolotonosets) in Russian service, Moskova, Soviet designation Project 1123 Kondor, was the country’s first operational aircraft carrier. Commissioned Christmas Day 1967, the 15,000-ton flattop could carry as many as 18 helicopters in addition to a pretty significant battery of ASW and air defense weapons. She outlived her only completed sister (Leningrad) and was kept in service until 1996. Following the end of the Cold War, she was quietly retired and scrapped without ceremony.
Meanwhile, VP-5, founded in 1937, is still around, now flying the P-8A Poseidon. Their motto is “No Fox Like a Mad Fox!”