Biggest Aviation-related Technical Blunders in a Movie etc?

[ZRX61]

Mr Solo, a parsec is a unit of length, not time.

If you click the *units* drop down menu in AutoCad it actually lists parsecs as one of the options.....for when you are drafting something REALLY REALLY REALLY big..

[rwdfresno]

Is there any aviation movie that doesnt have something wrong with it ?

Clearly we have missed the "Amazing Stories" episode "The Mission." It seems to be historically and technically acurate in every way.

Ryan

[Randy Haskin]

Is there any aviation movie that doesnt have something wrong with it ?

Clearly we have missed the "Amazing Stories" episode "The Mission." It seems to be historically and technically acurate in every way.

Ryan

"Down and locked, down and locked, down and locked...."

[Holedigger]

Well Randy, make sure to take a nice sketchpad and a couple good pencils with you, never know when something may fall off your plane and you will have to quickly draw a new one!

For a good old animated aviation theme, try Heavy Metal's annimation...where a B-17F crew gets turned into zombies! They get some things right and others...well...I'll let you be the judge! Fun in a weird sort of way!
http://www.videosift.com/video/B-17-Sca ... -The-Movie

[Rajay]

Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull:
When did Pan Am start operating AN-2s? Especially during the begnining of the Cold War?! And when Indy and the gang are flying on the Russian Transport it looks just a little too fake for my taste. Was that CGI plane even based off a real aircraft?

Oh come on it still looked cool Actually, the funniest part was that when you were close up you could see where they added weathering to the paint job and where they have areas that are supposed to be chipped paint they have "rust" much like you would see on a ship. Apparently they think that aircraft are skinned with steel as opposed to fabric, aluminum or other lighter alloys.

I'm really digging the registration - "N48550" is and has been (forever!) Grumman G-21A Goose s/n 1061, ex-Alaska Coastal-Ellis Airlines, Antilles Air Boats, and Larry Teufel of Hillsboro OR; it's now owned by none other than Jimmy Buffett. If you were going to make up a registration for a Pan-Am AN-2, why would you pick that one out of all the other possible N-numbers?

Also, this weekend AMC had their air disasters movie marathon and I recorded a couple on our DVR. I saw The Crowded Sky with Dana Andrews and Efrem Zimbalist Jr.

EZ was a Navy Commander who is flying east to Washington from North Island San Diego with Troy Donahue in the back seat of his T-33 (which had no markings other than some day-glo orange panels and a big black ID number - but the "North Island" ramp was full of F-86's w/4 20mm cannons - so they'd have been F-86H's or later - and there were also quite a few trees but no water in the background...)

DA was flying west from Washington to LA on the same airway V-16 in a DC-7 and due to the usual chain of unfortunate events (a busted radio, a sloppy pilot, some weather here or there etc) they collide, the T-33 explodes, but the heroic airline crew safely lands the DC-7 with a folded nosegear. Best part of the movie was Anne Francis - as hot as ever!

Robert Osborne of AMC pointed out before it even came to me that 15 years later, it was Dana Andrews flying the little airplane (a Baron) that collides with Efrem Zimbalist's big airplane (a 747) in Airport 75. Nothing is ever new or original in Hollywood!

The other movie that I caught was Crash Landing with Garry Merrill and the future Nancy Reagan (still Davis in this movie - apparently her last feature.) Halfway across the Atlantic from Lisbon to NYC, two engines go rough or quit and the "heroic" crew (all four of them in the cockpit, pilot, co-pilot, flt eng and navigator) just sit there and look at the engines. Hmmm? Don't you think you should DO something guys? They end up ditching the plane near a Navy destroyer escort and except for a bumpy landing, everything else goes perfectly and they all get out and they don't even forget the kid's dog.

I especially like the part when they decided to set all of the parakeets that they were carrying free - at 13,000 feet and 145 knots, they opened a window and dumped them out of their cages. Nice!

I don't know why these movies qualified as "classics" - they were just more of the usual sappy soap opera drivel.

[Steve Nelson]

Clearly we have missed the "Amazing Stories" episode "The Mission." It seems to be historically and technically accurate in every way.

While touring the restoration shop at the NMUSAF last year, the tour guide was showing us the ball turret from the Memphis Belle. She said that despite accounts in books and movies, museum researchers have found no actual record of a gunner being stuck in the turret and killed in a belly landing. In fact, she said that so many different things would have to go wrong simultaneously that it's highly unlikely. The closest thing to a documented incident is an account written years later by Andy Rooney, who claimed to have witnessed it when he was a war correspondent in England.

SN

[Speedy]

Is there any aviation movie that doesnt have something wrong with it ?

Clearly we have missed the "Amazing Stories" episode "The Mission." It seems to be historically and technically acurate in every way.

Ryan

"Down and locked, down and locked, down and locked...."

Well, Hoss...considering I once landed gear up in the simulator on a check ride....perhaps that mantra could have helped me out!

[Randy Haskin]

Did you try and draw yourself a pair of candy cane landing gear?

[JDK]

Clearly we have missed the "Amazing Stories" episode "The Mission." It seems to be historically and technically accurate in every way.

While touring the restoration shop at the NMUSAF last year, the tour guide was showing us the ball turret from the Memphis Belle. She said that despite accounts in books and movies, museum researchers have found no actual record of a gunner being stuck in the turret and killed in a belly landing. In fact, she said that so many different things would have to go wrong simultaneously that it's highly unlikely. The closest thing to a documented incident is an account written years later by Andy Rooney, who claimed to have witnessed it when he was a war correspondent in England.

See: http://www.snopes.com/glurge/military/ridedown.asp

[CAPFlyer]

I'm really digging the registration - "N48550" is and has been (forever!) Grumman G-21A Goose s/n 1061, ex-Alaska Coastal-Ellis Airlines, Antilles Air Boats, and Larry Teufel of Hillsboro OR; it's now owned by none other than Jimmy Buffett. If you were going to make up a registration for a Pan-Am AN-2, why would you pick that one out of all the other possible N-numbers?

Have you ever considered that maybe it was intentional?

(believe me, you'd be surprised with the number of things in movies that you'd think were goofs but were actually intentional - usually an homage to someone or some show/movie/production)

Edited to fix quotes (sorry if it confused anyone)

Last edited by CAPFlyer on Sun Mar 07, 2010 10:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[rwdfresno]

I'm really digging the registration - "N48550" is and has been (forever!) Grumman G-21A Goose s/n 1061, ex-Alaska Coastal-Ellis Airlines, Antilles Air Boats, and Larry Teufel of Hillsboro OR; it's now owned by none other than Jimmy Buffett. If you were going to make up a registration for a Pan-Am AN-2, why would you pick that one out of all the other possible N-numbers?

Have you ever considered that maybe it was intentional?

(believe me, you'd be surprised with the number of things in movies that you'd think were goofs but were actually intentional - usually an homage to someone or some show/movie/production)

After the shooting of the final scenes for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, where I took this picture, I attended the rap party. I was standing next to George Lucas when he picked up a beer and started talking about what he described as his "friend's brewery" making the beer. The beer was Land Shark Lager which is made by Margaritaville Brewery. As you may know Margaritaville Brewery is owned by Jimmy Buffett.

Ryan

[CAPFlyer]

See what I mean?

[Rajay]

Well, the Indiana Jones/Crystal Skull movie was released in 2008, so it was probably filmed in 2007. Jimmy Buffett didn't buy N48550 from Larry Teufel until September 2009 - although he had been leasing it periodically before that. As a homage to Jimmy Buffett, I think that's a bit of a stretch and an inside "joke" that not too many people would get.

[Randy Haskin]

I attended the rap party.

Hmmm, I would never have guessed Lucas was into rap.

[rwdfresno]

I attended the rap party.

Hmmm, I would never have guessed Lucas was into rap.

haha yes wrap...I'm not sure which to blame it on my horrible typing or horrible spelling.