A Navy maritime patrol presence that extends back to the 1920s on Oahu is continuing — albeit in reduced capacity — with the arrival of two P-8A Poseidon jets whose job includes a Hawaii homeland defense mission.

A detachment of the sub-hunting and surveillance planes and three crews recently came out from Whidbey Island, Wash., for a continuous presence that will see Whidbey crews rotate through Hawaii for two to three months at a time, the Navy said.

The planes are with Patrol Squadron 4, the “Skinny Dragons,” which was based on Oahu for many years with the propeller-driven P-3 Orion. The unit left on its final deployment out of Hawaii in March 2016 and returned to Whidbey, which became its new home base.

“As a former Hawaii-based squadron, VP-4 is excited to be back,” squadron Executive Officer Cmdr. Christopher Purcell said in an email. “The Skinny Dragons have returned as the first maritime patrol and reconnaissance squadron on the West Coast to fly the P-8 Poseidon aircraft.”

Purcell said the P-8s will “support standing U.S. Pacific Command homeland defense requirements around Hawaii and the U.S. West Coast.”

The P-8s will be based at Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe Bay until work starts in late fall on the base’s runway, then will move to Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam.

Across the Navy, P-8s are replacing P-3 Orions, which were a familiar sight in Hawaii for more than half a century at Barbers Point and then Kaneohe Bay. VP-9, the last of Kaneohe’s regular patrol squadrons which also included VP-4 and VP-47, left Hawaii in March. All were reassigned to Whidbey.

It’s not the first time since their move that the versatile P-8s have come through Hawaii, but it’s their first deployment here, the Navy said.

A derivative of the Boeing 737-800, the P-8 is designed for long-range anti-submarine warfare; anti-surface warfare; and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions. It can carry missiles and torpedoes.

It is capable of broad-area maritime and littoral operations and is being paired with the MQ-4C Triton unmanned aerial vehicle to expand coverage across the vast reaches of the Pacific.

“The number of submarines in the world is increasing rapidly. Other countries are either building or purchasing advanced, quiet and extremely hard-to-find submarines, and we need to be able to match that technology to be able to detect them,” Rear Adm. Matt Carter, then commander of the Navy’s Patrol and Reconnaissance Group, said in 2013 when the Poseidon entered initial operating capability.

P-8s can fly at a top altitude of 41,000 feet, up to 560 mph, and can range as much as 4,500 miles from base without refueling. The aircraft has twice the sonobuoy processing capability to detect submarines and can carry 30 percent more of the devices, which are launched into the sea, than the older P-3s.

VP-4’s history page said it was first established in 1928 at Pearl Harbor. At the time it used H-16 seaplanes. It was redesignated VP-22 in 1938 and was nearly destroyed in the Japanese attack on Dec. 7, 1941, the squadron said.

Another P-3 squadron of several planes actually still exists at Kaneohe Bay, “special projects” VPU-2, which has highly secretive missions. The planes are often gone, but the unit will remain in Hawaii into the near future.