"Dog Robber: Part 1", had to have been based upon an occurrence in April 2001. The crew of an EP-3E, which had been damaged by a Chinese J-8 fighter and was forced to land in Hainan, China was released. The most of the flight crew were deployed out of So. Japan. However, due to the secrecy surrounding the incident, the crew had to fly to Washington State where they were reunited with family members.
The EP-3 in this episode is a notified version of the P-3 Orion plane. The P-3 was a sub hunter that was retired in December 2012