People are harping on about the Nimrod being an old design, Boeing's 367-80 (Dash 80) circa 1952 went on to become the 720,707 and the RC-135 and the same fuse barrels were used in the 727 and 757.
That same 50+ year old RC-135 is being converted to Rivet Joint for the RAF, at least structurally the MRA4 was over 80% new and would have lasted decades......someday someone will realise what a good asset we scrapped.