History Main / JustPlaneWrong

* In ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'', we have Quagmire, an airline pilot. In the episode "Airport '07", Peter somehow manages to drive onto an airport ramp post-9/11, ride up to an airplane on the tarmac, detach the fuel hose from said plane, and somehow stick it in his truck. Must be a one-size-fits-all hose. And security must be pretty [[StealthPun lax]]. And that truck must be a diesel truck to be able to run on Jet A. And nobody was manning the refueling truck until after Peter had used it to fuel his truck and leave. The plane later crashes after running out of fuel, and Quagmire, its pilot, loses his job, as if it's his fault that the refueling crew failed to keep an eye on their truck. He confronts Peter, admonishing "[[SarcasmMode No Peter, it's perfectly normal to siphon jet fuel from an active runway with the intention of flying a pickup truck!]]".
** Also falls into this due to the "active runway" comment - an active runway is the runway currently in use. Runways aren't all in use at once, but are opened or closed on the basis of wind direction. The plane in the episode sounds like it was on a taxiway instead of a runway, as being on the runway itself is only allowed if you're about to take off, are landing, or quickly crossing it. Of course, Quagmire could have just been exaggerating when he said active runway. Or the writers thought "active runway" meant that the airport was in use, not out of commission, and not the runway itself.

* A possibly deliberate example: a "The Broonites" cartoon in ''Magazine/PrivateEye'' has Gordon Brown being packed off to Afghanistan in an English Electric Lightning as a passenger. The Lightning is long-retired and the one shown is a one-seater. This may well be a jibe at poor British military equipment. The Lightning was also a (very) short-range fighter.
* An issue of one of DC's ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'' titles had the hero flying escort for an American aircraft that was [[spoiler:supposedly]] taking a captured political leader to stand trial. However, rather than the cargo/passenger plane of whatever size that might have been expected, the aircraft in question was a ''single-seat'' F-16.
* The ''Franchise/XMen'''s modified Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird has an interior that -- depending on the artist -- looks as large as a fair-sized business jet, easily accommodating seats for five to ten X-Men. The real SR-71 is a two-seater, with most of the fuselage presumably given over to fuel tanks and electronics. The X-Men also routinely launch their Blackbird straight up like a rocket from a secret hanger under A SCHOOL in upstate New York. And the neighbours never seem to notice or complain to the FAA about the sonic booms. Later Blackbirds dispense with being based on the SR-71 and use extensive [[ImportedAlienPhlebotinum alien technology]], allowing them to have whatever characteristics the plot needs without being ''quite'' as bad about this trope.
* ''Franchise/TheAvengers'' Quinjets (presumably named for the five jet or rocket or ramscoop or AppliedPhlebotinum engines in the rear) can get away with more, because they're not even marginally based on a real airframe. Nor, depending on the artist, even a consistent design from issue to issue. Like the X-Men's SR-71, the Quinjets can blast off from beneath Avengers Mansion in midtown Manhattan without disturbing the neighbours or shattering the glass of every skyscraper in a 20 block radius. According to Tony Stark in the ''WesternAnimation/TheAvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes'' animated series, despite having the aerodynamic characteristics of a Keurig coffeemaker, they can fly at Mach 8, operate underwater (in the animated version they actually launch via an underwater launch tube that leads to the East River) and even fly in space. And, apparently, their AppliedPhlebotinum engines never seem to need refueling. Maybe that's how the X-Men's SR-71 can hold so many people. And despite having the airframe equivalent of mutant superpowers, we're informed by the same ''Earth's Mightiest Heroes'' animated series that they only cost $20 million apiece, less than the $27 million sticker price of a Bombardier Q400 turboprop passenger plane. One would think $20 '''billion''' would've been more plausible, and [[{{Fiction500}} Tony Stark could still afford it]].
* A ''ComicBook/MortadeloYFilemon'' comic deals with the titular duo making tests on a plane designed by [[OmnidisciplinaryScientist Professor Bacterio]] which, among other things, can completely stop in the air ''with the same sound a car makes when braking''. It is somewhat of a RunningGag that Mortadelo can actually ''sink'' a plane into an airport's runway - while trying to ''[[EpicFail lift off]]''. And there are several instances of them being given planes slow enough that an old sparrow can go faster than them.
* ''Franchise/WonderWoman'':

* In William S. Lind's ''Literature/{{Victoria}}'' the Nothern Confederacy is easily able to locate and intercept stealth aircraft because they employ 1950s long-wave radar tech. If old radar could find stealth bombers, we would employ it alongside or incorporate it into modern sets. NC pilots are also easily able to defeat air-to-air missiles by flying in diamond or box formations, the missiles always pass harmlessly through the center.

* Somewhat averted in the Disney World War II animated film ''Victory through Airpower''; the fictitious heavy bombers taking off from Alaska to bomb Japan bear curious resemblance to real life B-36 Peacemakers, though they were in reality not produced until after the war. Of course, Alexander Severskey, who was the narrator for the film, was himself a major aviation pioneer and is said to have insisted on technical accuracy for even the fictitious planes depicted in the film.

[[folder:Film -- Animated]]
* ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles1'': Elasti-girl's radio dialogue when the missiles are closing in on her plane is actually accurate, since her use of "Buddy Spike" makes sense in context since she believes the island to be friendly and the term is used to warn the "spiker" that the radar lock was from a friendly and can be disregarded. The only goof is that it was a ground radar, and the proper term for a ground radar threat indication is "Mud" followed by a clock direction. Also, the tail number -- [[WesternAnimation/TheIronGiant IG99]] -- is invalid for an American-registered aircraft.
* Toward the end of ''WesternAnimation/RockADoodle'', the rodent character refers to a large, twin-rotor helicopter the main characters apparently stole as a Sikorsky, but in real life, Sikorsky never manufactured any twin-rotor helicopters at all. If anything, the depicted helicopter bears more of a resemblance to Boeing's Chinook with comically-oversized engines and the side door moved back about halfway along the fuselage.
[[/folder]]

* ''WesternAnimation/TransformersAnimated'' has Starscream, who is identified in dialogue as being a Harrier but at no point uses the trademark VTOL capabilities (even though as an alien he could hover in place as long as he wanted without having to worry about wasting fuel). He also has more in common with the Russian [=Su-47=], and the fact Harrier production ended in 2003 means it is unlikely a Harrier resembling Starscream will ever be built.
* ''WesternAnimation/TransformersPrime'', meanwhile, has Agent Fowler, who is frequently seen flying around in a fighter jet in his [[LimitedWardrobe business suit]] instead of the proper pilot's uniform which is necessary to protect the wearer from the g-forces and ensure they always have a healthy supply of oxygen. This [[AuthorsSavingThrow does get explained in season 2]] where it turns out the fighter jet was modified by Ratchet so he could fly without one, but this still doesn't explain [[{{Hammerspace}} where he was storing]] the [[FunWithAcronyms DINGUS]] in Convoy.
** Even ignoring [[DarkActionGirl Airachnid]] getting an alt mode of an RAH-66 Comanche, which as mentioned above was cancelled with only two being built well over a decade before the show came out, she somehow gets it from scanning Fowler's helicopter - which, like every other helicopter in the show, is ''[[EveryHelicopterIsAHuey a Huey]]''.

** The 1943 WesternAnimation/BugsBunny cartoon "WesternAnimation/FallingHare" has a few instances, most of them are intentional for comedy, most notably the final gag where the plane's nosedive into an inevitable crash-landing comes to a sudden halt just feet away from impact, in complete defiance of gravity, because it ran out of fuel. On the other hand, there is the actual goof of an American airfield utilizing what appears to be a Heinkel He-111.

* Toward the end of ''WesternAnimation/RockADoodle'', the rodent character refers to a large, twin-rotor helicopter the main characters apparently stole as a Sikorsky, but in real life, Sikorsky never manufactured any twin-rotor helicopters at all. If anything, the depicted helicopter bears more of a resemblance to Boeing's Chinook with comically-oversized engines and the side door moved back about halfway along the fuselage.

* The 1952 WesternAnimation/BugsBunny cartoon "WesternAnimation/HareLift" is full of this, with a giant plane doing all sorts of impossible things. All quite intentional, in service of RuleOfFunny.
** The earlier 1943 cartoon "WesternAnimation/FallingHare" has a few of these as well, though like the above most of these are intentional for comedy, most notably the final gag where the plane's nosedive into an inevitable crash-landing comes to a sudden halt just feet away from impact, in complete defiance of gravity, because it ran out of fuel. On the other hand, there is the actual goof of an American airfield utilizing what appears to be a Heinkel He-111.

* ''Manga/Area88'' has a good number of mistakes. Simply in the first dogfight in the opening episode of the 2004 anime, we have Shin's F-8 Crusader engaging a flight of four Mig-17 fighters in a dogfight. The F-8, while reportedly a good combat aircraft, was more known for the strength of it's engine, not it's turning circle. Shin maneuvers with the enemy planes, which are not capable of supersonic fight and thus slower, in a turning battle. The Mig-17 did not have hydraulically boosted control surfaces, and the plane could not handle turning at high speed, thus Crusader pilots were instructed to keep their speed up when engaging them. Shin meanwhile is shown in close proximity and actively moving with them, enough so that the Migs are able to get weapons on him twice, though he managed to evade, and eventually downs three of them. Shin's F-8 is also depicted with the missiles on his aircraft mounted under the wings, while a Crusader typically carried it's air to air missiles on a Y-shaped pylon on the side of the fuselage, just behind the canopy. In a later episode we see Kim's AV-8B Harrier II take a direct missile strike from an enemy MiG-21, seemingly downing him. He pops up later in the fight in a hover, launching missiles from what he calls a 'makeshift SAM site'. Not only would this quickly bleed out his fuel(Harriers typically only had 90 seconds of hover time), but attempting to angle his plane upwards to the ridiculous degree (nearly standing the plane on it's tail) shown would quickly result in him crashing. Also that missile hit he took earlier in the dogfight was sufficient enough to knock out the radio and visibly injure the pilot, yet the aircraft remains airworthy and the cockpit controls intact.

* ''Manga/Area88'' has a good number of mistakes. Simply in the first dogfight in the opening episode of the 2004 anime, we have Shin's F-8 Crusader engaging a flight of four Mig-17 fighters in a dogfight. The F-8, while reportedly a good combat aircraft, was more known for the strength of it's engine, not it's turning circle. Shin maneuvers with the enemy planes, which are not capable of supersonic fight and thus slower, in a turning battle. The Mig-17 did not have hydraulically boosted control surfaces, and the plane could not handle turning at high speed, thus Crusader pilots were instructed to keep their speed up when engaging them. Shin meanwhile is shown in close proximity and actively moving with them, enough so that the Migs are able to get weapons on him twice, though he managed to evade, and eventually downs three of them. Shin's F-8 is also depicted with the missiles on his aircraft mounted under the wings, while a Crusader typically carried it's air to air missiles on a Y-shaped pylon on the side of the fuselage, just behind the canopy.

* Any news story on a cabin depressurization event will invariably mention the plane "plummeting" from cruising altitude when the oxygen masks deploy. The pilots are executing their training with a controlled descent, albeit a fast one that might naturally alarm passengers who aren't familiar with it. The point is to get to an altitude with breathable air as quickly as possible, as planes only have about 30 minutes of oxygen when the masks drop down and there will be an inevitable few stragglers who can't get the masks on in time. Hypoxia is nothing to mess around with, and it can cause brain damage and death in minutes. The pilots need oxygen too, obviously.

* You would expect an ''airline'' to avoid this, but American Airlines once caused a major crash because they were paranoid about wake turbulence. Wake turbulence can be dangerous; however, for a large plane such as an Airbus A300, it isn't anywhere ''near'' as dangerous as whoever wrote the Advanced Aircraft Maneuvering Program used by American Airlines until the mid-2000s apparently thought it was. The flight simulator for wake turbulence included an extreme bank that trainees only got out of with enormous rudder deflections. Enormous as in ''Airbus specifically warned against them because they could cause rudder failure''. In other words, American Airlines was teaching their pilots to overreact to wake turbulence in a dangerous fashion. This idiotic aspect of the program was going to cause a fatal pilot error accident sooner or later, and just two months after the September 11, 2001 attacks, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_587 it did]], killing all 260 occupants, five poor bystanders, and two dogs (one in the cargo hold, another on the ground). 265 humans and two dogs dead, all because a major airline allowed someone who rolled a 1 on understanding the laws of physics to write training materials.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'': Elasti-girl's radio dialogue when the missiles are closing in on her plane is actually accurate, since her use of "Buddy Spike" makes sense in context since she believes the island to be friendly and the term is used to warn the "spiker" that the radar lock was from a friendly and can be disregarded. The only goof is that it was a ground radar, and the proper term for a ground radar threat indication is "Mud" followed by a clock direction. Also, the tail number -- [[WesternAnimation/TheIronGiant IG99]] -- is invalid for an American-registered aircraft.

* ''Anime/Area88'' has a good number of mistakes. Simply in the first dogfight in the opening episode of the 2004 anime, we have Shin's F-8 Crusader engaging a flight of four Mig-17 fighters in a dogfight. The F-8, while reportedly a good combat aircraft, was more known for the strength of it's engine, not it's turning circle. Shin maneuvers with the enemy planes, which are not capable of supersonic fight and thus slower, in a turning battle. The Mig-17 did not have hydraulically boosted control surfaces, and the plane could not handle turning at high speed, thus Crusader pilots were instructed to keep their speed up when engaging them. Shin meanwhile is shown in close proximity and actively moving with them, enough so that the Migs are able to get weapons on him twice, though he managed to evade, and eventually downs three of them.
** Shin's F-8 is also depicted with the missiles on his aircraft mounted under the wings, while a Crusader typically carried it's air to air missiles on a Y-shaped pylon on the side of the fuselage, just behind the canopy.

* ''Anime/Area88'' has a good number of mistakes. Simply in the first dogfight in the opening episode, we have Shin's F-8 Crusader engaging a flight of four Mig-17 fighters in a dogfight. The F-8, while reportedly a good combat aircraft, was more known for the strength of it's engine, not it's turning circle. Shin maneuvers with the enemy planes, which are not capable of supersonic fight and thus slower, in a turning battle. The Mig-17 did not have hydraulically boosted control surfaces, and the plane could not handle turning at high speed, thus Crusader pilots were instructed to keep their speed up when engaging them. Shin meanwhile is shown in close proximity and actively moving with them, enough so that the Migs are able to get weapons on him twice, though he managed to evade, and eventually downs three of them.

* '''Cost and Availability of Aircraft:''' Sure, scoring a four-seater Cherokee or Cessna might be as easy as walking down to the nearest airfield and saying "Who wants to be in a movie?", but larger or older aircraft, especially UsefulNotes/WorldWarII era, are expensive, rare, and require special care and insurance. Before the advent of CG, most movie makers resorted to modifying or painting more commonly-available training aircraft to play the part of warbirds in movies (see also WeaponsUnderstudies). Availability can also be affected by the period during which the work was filmed—it's not like the Air Force was just gonna give you the keys to their high-altitude spy planes during the UsefulNotes/ColdWar (The Soviets certainly weren't going to let you touch theirs). As such, many films rely heavily on StockFootage.

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[[folder:Video Games]]
* ''VideoGame/{{Battlefield}}'' games tend to have slightly silly flight models (the original's planes tend to practically ''leap'' into the air), while aircraft in later games are far tougher than they should be (''Desert Combat's'' AC-130 can fly straight through the factory chimneys at El Al, while ''[=BF2=]'s'' helicopters can survive a direct hit from a main battle tank) and with EasyLogistics in full swing (helicopters can re-arm by hovering over runways, planes just by ''flying'' over them; this is generally regarded as a fairly serious GameBreaker since it means they require no support of any kind). The pilot of a multi-seat aircraft can also [[CrewOfOne instantly teleport between seats]]; skilled players sometimes use this in helicopters to fire TV-guided missiles despite having no gunner.
** In ''VideoGame/BattlefieldBadCompany 2'', Haggard incorrectly identifies an Antonov An-124 that the game's BigBad uses as the Antonov An-225. This example may be intentional, as the information Haggard recites off the top of his head (the ''Mriya'' name's meaning, "Dream", and carry weight of 253 tons) are things that one would have to have done quite a bit of research on the plane to have it on-hand like that; it's also surprising, both to the rest of the squad and the audience, for [[CloudCuckoolander Haggard of all people]] to actually know that much about, well, anything (he responds to the squad's stunned silence with "What? I can know stuff!"). The fact that he's ''wrong'' makes it even funnier.
** The ''VideoGame/{{Battlefield 3}}'' mission "Going Hunting" places the player in the shoes of a Radar Intercept Officer aboard an F/A-18 Super Hornet, but there are numerous mistakes. For starters, the pilot and co-pilot walk out onto the flight deck without putting on their helmets until just before climbing aboard their craft - real pilots have hearing protection on long before they get that close to an active plane, because even when idle jet engines are ''loud''. The pilot also misuses "bogies" to refer to aircraft they already know are enemies, and one of the objectives halfway through the opening dogfight tells you to "Take out the remaining [=MiGs=]", when the enemies are flying the Sukhoi Su-35S. On the other hand, even real Naval aviators have applauded the actual takeoff for showing the real speed and exhilaration of using a steam catapult to launch off the carrier.
** The trailer for the updated version of the Gulf of Oman map for [=BF3=] shows Marine variant F-35 fighter jets using their VTOL capability to act as impromptu attack helicopters. A real F-35 would be incapable of doing this without wasting a ton of fuel.
** The same game's F/A-18E Super Hornet incorrectly has Marine Corps markings. The US Marines have refused to use the Super Hornet, so as to not endanger their purchase of the F-35B.
* ''VideoGame/SplinterCell'' has a few examples of playing this trope straight. In the first title, Georgia is depicted as having what looks like either a [=MiG-29=] or a Su-27, neither of which are correct. Additionally, the depiction of the interior dimensions of the V-22 Osprey are noticeably generous to anyone who has actually stepped foot in one. Large computer bank on each wall with room to move comfortably in between? Not likely...
* Mostly averted in the ''VideoGame/AceCombat'' series, though there are occasional oddities — in the real world, the Su-47 Berkut is a tech demo, and only one exists. In the games, multiple Su-47s are flown in battle by the various sides, all the way up to whole squadrons using the model, like Gault in ''The Belkan War''. Also subverted on occasion, however; for example, both the X-02 Wyvern and the ADF-01 Falken superfighters, which look implausibly cool, have been modeled in the realistic flight sim X-Plane and successfully proven to be airworthy under modern flight knowledge limitations. This far from stops fanboys of Glorious Mother Russia insisting in Website/YouTube comments that no pesky American jet should be able to keep up with their beloved [=MiGs=] and Sukhois, never mind score a gunkill.
** Similarly, when they came out, multiple titles feature more Lockheed-Martin F-22 fighters serving in ''multiple'' air forces then were operational in the ''actual'' world, and with the decision of military spending in the United States, will probably ever be operational.
** F-117s and tech demos like the X-29 and F-15 S/MTD are equipped with machine guns, which they didn't have in real life (and which the S/MTD ''couldn't'' have, since the right canard is right in the path of a regular Eagle's gun); some later games in the series do at least put the guns in gunpods under the wings or fuselage for craft that didn't/couldn't have an internal gun. The F-117 is also equipped with air-to-air missiles; the real thing was a dedicated attacker, despite the F-number designation,[[note]]which was mostly for propaganda purposes, since even before it was officially unveiled the "stealth fighter" had already reached mythical status among the civilian public[[/note]] and only had room for two bombs.
** ''VideoGame/AceCombat04ShatteredSkies'' added the Fox and other brevity codes for launching weapons, but most air-to-air special weapons are called with "Fox One", the term for semi-active radar-guided weapons, despite them being modeled after and programmed to act like ''active'' radar-guided weapons that would be called with "Fox Three". ''VideoGame/{{Ace Combat 5|TheUnsungWar}}'' fixed this (applying "Fox One" solely to the weapon identified as a semi-active weapon and using "Fox Three" for the others), but still has the issue of air-to-ground missiles using Fox codes instead of proper terms like "Bruiser" for the LASM; this too was fixed in ''[[VideoGame/AceCombatZeroTheBelkanWar Zero]]''.
** The most egregious - [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality albeit deliberate]] - departure from reality is the missile armament on the planes - first, the planes can carry [[BottomlessMagazines a ludicrous number of missiles]] (upwards of fifty on the low-end fighters early in the series, and up to more than a ''hundred'' in more modern games; real missile armaments, even on the most heavily laden of proposed fighters, such as the F-15X, max out at 22, and few planes currently in service can carry more than 12), and second, the standard heat-seeking missiles are able to lock on to, and are equally effective against, both fast-moving fighters as well as hardened bunkers and buildings. A lot of the special weapons are also more viable than in reality; while you still can't lock onto an air target with a dedicated air-to-ground weapon, ground and sea targets are given no such distinction, so there's nothing stopping you from destroying a fortified bunker with a Harpoon that shouldn't work as well as it does over land (the only difference between the "LAGM" and "LASM" is that one dives upon reaching the target and has a wider blast radius, while the other dives upon firing and focuses its full power on the target).
** The in-game descriptions for the jets occasionally fall into this; for example, ''Shattered Skies'' refers to a number of the useable planes as having "forward-swept" wings — the above-mentioned Su-47 and X-02 are the only jets in the game that feature them. Apparently they mistook (or mistranslated) canards as "forward-swept wings", since a lot of the planes described as forward-swept designs ''do'' have canards.[[note]]It wouldn't be the only such mistake in the game - turning ability in the game also seems to have been mistaken as "able to roll really well", where high-end planes like the Eurofighter and Su-37 can do a complete barrel roll in half a second but can only actually change pitch as well as the F-4E you start the game with.[[/note]]
** In ''VideoGame/AceCombat2'', an F-22's thrust vectoring is shown off at one point in the intro cinematic, but its engines point in different directions during a roll, which the real F-22's engines can't actually do (their thrust-vectoring is two dimensional, and only assists with pitch). There's also the issue of it and its Su-35 wingmate taking off from an aircraft carrier when neither of them are carrier-capable (nor are Russian carrier planes able to use steam catapults, since Russian carriers don't have them).
** Earlier games in the series utilized a Flanker that was referred to as the original Su-27 but was very clearly not one, having the canards of upgraded models like the Su-33 and original Su-35. Likewise for other planes that were still in development at the time of the games' releases; for instance, the F-22 was not actually an F-22 until ''VideoGame/AceCombat3Electrosphere'', every prior game (released before the production F-22 was finalized) using the YF-22 prototype, of which only two existed, and the Su-47 in ''04'' being noticeably different from the real thing due to a lack of proper sources to model it after, being more of a hybrid between the real Su-47 and the fictional Su-43 from ''Electrosphere''.
** The main reason that the game can give a seemingly limitless supply of {{Super Prototype}}s and Tech Demonstrators to enemy and friendly fighter squadrons [[HandWave is because it takes place in an alternate universe]] that goes through [[ForeverWar at least two large-scale wars per decade]] (because [[NuclearWeaponsTaboo nuclear proliferation doesn't exist]] to make such aggression the quickest way to turn the game into a ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'' clone), where the outcome of these wars very often hinges on the prowess of air support (Erusea in ''04'' is able to take over almost the entirety of Usea before the game starts simply by having an extremely effective anti-air defense system that reaches over most of the continent) and the possibilities of such aircraft entering active service with any military are as such perfectly reasonable. Although this then raises the question of why an alternate Earth with different geography and politics has managed to produce the same planes, credited to the same companies, as our world -- and that's ''before'' you get into the issue of companies selling or licensing their designs [[WarForFunAndProfit to both sides of a conflict]] (granted, the latter fact actually becomes a plot point in [[VideoGame/AceCombat5TheUnsungWar the fifth game]]).
** ''VideoGame/AceCombatInfinity'', set in the real world, has an alternate justification for why there are so many rare or obsolete planes still flying in 2019 - following the Ulysses asteroid impact and most governments' reducing military spending to focus on rebuilding, a company called Wernher and Noah Enterprises have taken up production of military craft, streamlining the process via "Advanced Automated Aviation Plants" to the point that planes can be built quickly, cheaply, and efficiently so long as blueprints for it exist. This makes mercenary squadrons like the players are in a very lucrative business (what with a surplus of planes but a shortage of pilots to fly them), but also allows terrorist groups access to vast amounts of military hardware. That said, it still stretches plausibility when you realize that both planes which didn't exist prior to the Ulysses impact in 1999, such as the Su-35S (first flight in 2008), the T-50 (2010), and the ATD-X (2016) and even fictional designs from the Strangereal universe, up to and including the R-101 Delphinus and X-49 Night Raven from ''Electrosphere'' (set in ''[[TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture 2040]]'', for context) are available with little explanation, the first handful handwaved as coming from an undefined "hostile country" before the descriptions for later ones straight-up forgot this game is set in an alternate universe.
** ''VideoGame/AceCombatJointAssault'' and ''VideoGame/AceCombat7SkiesUnknown'' pay particular attention to carrier compatibility. For one mission, if the plane you select has an extant naval variant (or for the former game, select either one of the 2 prop fighters), you start with a carrier launch; if it doesn't, you perform a mid-air refuelling instead. Similarly, when taking off from a beached carrier in the latter game, compatible aircraft will use the slingshot; incompatible ones start much further back on the flight deck and will need pretty much the whole length to get airborne.
** Ever since its first appearance in ''VideoGame/AceCombat6FiresOfLiberation'', the Su-33 Flanker-D has been depicted with a catapult connecting bar that isn't present on the real plane so that players can use it on missions that are restricted to carrier aircraft (which consistently use US CATOBAR carriers; the Su-33 is carrier-capable, but Russian carriers don't use a catapult launch system).
* ''VideoGame/CallOfDuty'':
** ''VideoGame/CallOfDutyModernWarfare2'' falls into this trap by showing F-15Cs in "The Gulag" mission but later referring to the Navy as bombing the gulag. The Navy uses F/A-18s and eventually will use F-35s for combat missions.[[note]]Ironically, this mission is clearly influenced by ''Film/TheRock'', and yet it makes the exact opposite error that movie does.[[/note]] Apparently the developers didn't want to bother modeling another aircraft. It's also rather sad considering ''VideoGame/{{Call of Duty 4|ModernWarfare}}'' correctly showed the Marines getting their air support from [=SuperCobras=] and Harriers - except in multiplayer, where again the F-15 carries out both their airstrikes and those of the SAS. A lesser goof is that the launching of AGM-88 [=HARMs=], which no F-15 variant is compatible with, is announced with a call of "Fox Three", which is the brevity code for ''air-to-air, active radar-guided'' missiles. An anti-radiation air-to-ground missile would be fired with a call of "Magnum".
** ''Call of Duty 4'' also features Mi-24 Hind attack helicopters in Chernobyl's vehicle graveyards. No such aircraft are present in the real graveyards.[[note]]This is most likely a ShoutOut to ''VideoGame/{{STALKER}}: Shadow of Chernobyl'', which also erroneously features Hinds in the vehicle graveyards.[[/note]] Zakhaev's forces also use Mi-28N Havocs for air cover in the Chernobyl missions, at best a couple months before the prototype for that version even had its first flight. Especially odd is that, in the rest of the game, where the Mi-28N being ubiquitous would have been temporally possible, the Ultranationalists are the only non-playable faction that ''doesn't'' use them.
** In a rather minor example, the loading screen for the famous "DeathFromAbove" mission features a wireframe model of the AC-130H "Spectre" (easily identified by two M61 Vulcan cannons), but the info given and what the player actually uses in the mission is a single 25mm GAU-12, indicating it's actually an AC-130U "Spooky". To go meta, most third-party sources state that the plane used is the Spectre based on the fifteen-second wireframe cutscene rather than the actual gameplay.
** ''Modern Warfare 2'' had a chronic case of EasyLogistics, with magical transatlantic Havocs-apparently-carrying-[=BMPs=] probably the biggest example.
** ''[[VideoGame/CallOfDutyWorldAtWar World at War]]'' gets this wrong on occasion. The worst example would be from the beginning of the Soviet campaign, where "German bombers" are seen flying over Stalingrad in a Blitz-style air-raid. Quite apart from the fact that the Germans did not use saturation bombing on Stalingrad at that point in the battle (what with their own men inside the city and everything), the planes featured are [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Focke-Wulf_Fw_200#Design_and_development Focke-Wulf Fw 200s,]] which were primarily naval reconnaissance and patrol aircraft, and had small bomb bays. Fw 200s ''were'' deployed to Stalingrad, but only as transport aircraft making up part of Goering's idiotic "air bridge". They were likely used in the game because they had four engines, and thus [[RuleOfCool looked more intimidating]] than the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dornier_Do_17 Dornier Do 17s]] and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinkel_He_111 Heinkel He 111s]] that would actually have been used. If the Germans had ever been serious about strategic bombing, they would have used [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinkel_He_177 He 177 "Greif" heavy bombers]] (though notoriously unreliable they could at least carry large bombloads), certainly not ''maritime patrol aircraft.''
*** The PBY Catalina the player mans the guns of in "Black Cats" has both Oerlikon 20mm cannons and Browning M1919 machine guns mounted on the bow. The cannons were often reported as a field modification to Catalinas in the Pacific, but they'd have to remove the machine guns to make the room for them - they weren't meant as an additional set of guns to support the M1919s but rather as straight-up replacements with better range and power. The Oerlikons are also depicted as part of a flexible mount to fire wherever the front turret is facing, when in reality they were on [[FixedForwardFacingWeapon fixed mounts]]. Additionally, the player's Catalina is severely undermanned - the real things had a crew of ten (pilot, copilot, flight engineer, navigator, radio and radar operators, and four gunners), but the player's crew is at half that (pilot and copilot alongside only two gunners, forcing the player character to waste time clambering between individual guns, and ''one'' guy [[CrewOfOne handling everything else]]), though in turn this helps answer the question of how your Catalina also has the room and engine power to carry up to six sailors pulled out of the ocean over the course of the mission.
*** The opening depicts the start of the war in the Pacific by way of having Zeroes dropping bombs, where more logical choices for such a mission would have been the "Kate" torpedo bomber or "Val" dive bomber - not to mention that the "bombs" in question are actually external fuel tanks.
** ''VideoGame/CallOfDutyBlackOps'' has U-2 spyplanes in multiplayer, which can be hit from the ground with small-arms fire. The actual U-2s were designed specifically to fly so high that then-existing anti-aircraft weaponry couldn't reach them. There is no in-game justification for why they would be flying so low, it's pure game balance.
*** It also features both NPC and player-controlled Hind gunships in Vietnam in 1968, a full year and a half before its first flight and four years before it entered military service, [[AnachronismStew but that's one of the lesser anachronisms in this game.]] A less noticeable but even more anachronistic goof is that the in-game Hind also has a missile warning system for when enemies acquire a lock with a missile launcher, and an automated countermeasure system to redirect the first such missile fired at it; the real craft didn't have such systems until they started losing a handful of Hinds to Mujahideen fighters utilizing Stinger missiles partway through the UsefulNotes/SovietInvasionOfAfghanistan almost two decades later.
*** On the subject of helicopters, there are several KillStreak rewards to call them in as support, but the model used depends solely on what kill streak is used rather than which side called them in, meaning it's perfectly possible for an American MACV-SOG operator to hop into the controls of a Soviet Hind helicopter while a Soviet Spetsnaz soldier fires a minigun from out the side of an American Huey. It's even stranger in the case of the Gunship kill streak, which calls in the player-controlled Hind, because the game does have the necessary models, animations and coding to have the Huey act in the same capacity - but it's only used for the opening of the final campaign level, multiplayer settling for the Hind with a PaletteSwap depending on which team you're on (players on the user's team see it in tan while enemies see it in gray).
** ''VideoGame/CallOfDutyModernWarfare3'''s second mission starts with a transmission from F-22 pilots preparing for a bombing run, but the wireframe models and information on the screen, along with the planes that actually show up in the mission, are all once again F-15s. On top of that, the loadout shown for them tries to claim that an external fuel tank is a JDAM, and for the actual air strike they launch "JDAM Missiles", which A) don't exist ([=JDAMs=] are a conversion kit for unguided bombs), and B) are actually AIM-120 [=AMRAAMs=], a dedicated air-to-air weapon.
** The ''[[VideoGame/COD2SpanishCivilWarMod Spanish Civil War]]'' mod: The group of downed German pilots you rescue in one of the Nationalist missions counts at least 10 people, but the wreck of their plane is shown to be a two-seat dive bomber.
** Zigzagged in the bomber level of ''[[VideoGame/CallOfDuty1 United Offensive]]''. B-17s were in fact used by the RAF's 90 Squadron under the designation Fortress I, and were flown by them on daylight raids over Europe... but they were the B-17C model, a plane with a dramatically different appearance than the "classic" look of the B-17E and F models depicted in the game. These models were only used by the RAF in Coastal Command roles, under the designation Fortress IIA and Fortress II, respectively. The bombers also appear to have a mix of British and American markings, wearing RAF roundels but USAAF tail codes.
*** The Spitfires seen escorting the bombers at the beginning of the above level appear to have sand filters fitted, unlikely for aircraft based in England rather than North Africa.
* ''F-19 Stealth Fighter'' was a combat flight simulator produced by Microprose in 1986. Its fictional plane used the same general appearance as the Testor Corporation's model kit, and was similar in capability to the F-19 featured in Creator/TomClancy's ''Literature/RedStormRising'' a few years earlier. Ironically the game was released on the same day that the U.S. military admitted the existence of the F-117, the RealLife "stealth fighter", which turned out to be quite a different bird. The 1991 sequel/remake added the real F-117, with real-world capability to match (flying the F-117 made for an easy mission, while flying the less-stealthy but air-to-air combat-capable F-19 made for a more exciting one).
* A carrier appears at the end of ''VideoGame/{{Prototype}}'' with F-35s and Apache helicopters shown sitting on the flight deck. The problem being the Apache is only used by the Army. The Navy also doesn't give up its flight deck space to the other services when they have their own aircraft to use. The Apaches could be handwaved as the Marines ''finally'' replacing the aging Super Cobra (rather than just upgrading it), but it probably isn't.
** They also don't use Blackhawks, so the ubiquitous transports should be upgraded Hueys, or if it's really the future, V-22 Osprey tilt-rotors. There are also, incidentally, no Bradley [=IFVs=] in the Marine inventory. If the developers had just name-swapped the Marines in dialogue with the Army, almost everything except the carrier would work fine.
* This trope is [[ShownTheirWork averted thoroughly]] in the UsefulNotes/WorldWarII combat flight simulator series ''VideoGame/IL2Sturmovik''. The demo of the same studio's next flight sim, ''VideoGame/BirdsOfSteel'', doesn't do as well, though, with the narrator of the tutorial at one point telling you to fire the "afterburners" on your P-47 Thunderbolt, a single-engined propeller plane which, due to the mechanics of piston-engined planes, could never be fitted with an afterburner even if they had been invented when the game was set. In the studio's next game, ''VideoGame/WarThunder'', putting a non-afterburning engine's throttle past 100%, and actually firing the afterburners on the jet engines that ''do'' have them, are both referred to more properly as War Emergency Power, or WEP for short.
** While a "Jug" certainly couldn't have a "reheat", the afterburner was actually around back then. The Italian Caproni-Campini [=CC1=] fighter prototype of 1940 used a radial engine to run a ducted fan (much like many modern radio-control flying models), and it did have a "thrust augmentator", which squirted aviation-grade gasoline into the duct behind the fans and ignited it. In other words, an afterburner. [[EarlyInstallmentWeirdness Early jet technology could get a little strange]].
* [=DiD=]'s 80s flight sim F-29 Retaliator has some rather odd quirks; for a start, the poster plane is actually the F-22, the game having been mis-announced by Ocean's notoriously fearsome CEO and nobody wanting to correct him (mirroring the urban legend about the SR-71's name). The YF-22 wouldn't fly until a year after the game came out, so the aircraft is based on concept art that closely resembles the much later [=MiG=] 1.44 prototype. But that's not even the start of the silliness.
** You are still in full control of your plane after ejecting from it. You can even kill yourself by bringing the plane around and crashing it into the descending pilot sprite.
** Landing gear raises instantly. [[PressXToDie It's possible to kill yourself the second a mission starts by pressing G]] (yes, a six foot drop is a fatal crash; apparently your plane is made from blasting caps and dynamite); have fun, since you ''want'' to press F and B to extend flaps and disengage the parking brake.
** There is actually an "F-29" in the game. It's the X-29 research aircraft magically turned into a fighter without changing anything about it -- even the paint scheme on the intro screen. The player is offered the choice between the not-F-22 and the F-29 at the start of the game.
* In ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3SnakeEater'' Volgin has a great number of Mi-24 Hind helicopters under his command, but the game takes place in 1964, six years before the helicopter went into production and even the first prototype was still very early in development. To give the designers some credit, the helicopters are the early Hind-A version with the polygonal canopy, instead of the iconic bubble canopy of the Hind-D and later models. It's also worth noting that the game explains that Volgin has priority access to what was at the time the cutting edge of Soviet equipment, and in a Codec conversation you find out that this is the first time anyone from the West has encountered the design, with Snake being the one who initially suggests the "Hind" callsign based on the fact that it looks to be a sleeker derivative of the Mi-8 Hip (although that potentially opens another can of worms when you consider the Mi-8 wasn't actually adopted by the Soviet military until '67).
** The game's designers deserve quite a bit of credit, as most of the 'wacky designs' for vehicles in the game (save the Shagohod, which is classically AwesomeButImpractical in traditional Metal Gear fashion) are drawn from rare but existing real life prototypes and models, such as the M21 insertion drone used by Naked Snake at the start of Operation Snake Eater (the in-game dates even match pretty closely with the real craft's first flight) and the Bartini Beriev WIG which appears in the ending scenes. Even the science-fiction-style hovering platforms used by patrols in some areas are based on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiller_VZ-1_Pawnee real]] [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_X-Jet prototypes]], proving once again that RealityIsUnrealistic.
* Averted by ''X-Plane''. While flight sims are generally pretty good at getting it right, ''X-Plane'''s attention to detail and real-world flight physics is so incredibly accurate it can be used, along with the right hardware, for getting one's FAA certification. That's right, they've [[ShownTheirWork shown so much work]] that many countries' aviation regulators agree it's just like flying a real airplane.
* ''Creator/TomClancy's VideoGame/{{HAWX}}'' starts out with the retirement flight of the eponymous Air Force squadron - flying Navy F/A-18C Hornets. You don't even get a choice of what plane to fly for the mission if you replay it in NewGamePlus.
** The first game also prevented planes from slowing down to below 1000 km/h outside of Assistance OFF mode. Even though this could have exceeded the never-exceed velocity of some slower planes. Even includes all planes breaking the sound barrier, which in real life could have shattered some of them. The second game fixes that, allowing the plane to stall even in Assistance ON mode, though the flight computer still makes it difficult to do so.
** When in Assistance OFF mode, the player is able to stall the plane out. It indeed does start plummeting near-immediately, but a stall is more likely to happen when the player is flying extremely slowly while turning a lot. Where it falls into this trope is that, if the player decides to stay in that state for the hell of it by keeping the plane level with the ground and holding the airbrakes, their plane will in most cases start to ''fly backwards''. This was fixed in the sequel.
** Like ''Ace Combat'', the planes are all given ludicrous amounts of missiles (this time the absolute minimum is about 88, flying a "Low Payload" craft on the highest difficulty which cuts missile counts, which as of 2022 is still four times as many as the most heavily-armed proposals can carry) that can target both fast-movers and stationary ground installations. The second game still gives planes at least three-fourths of a full ton worth of missiles, but the default ones are now explicitly-labeled "Heat-Seeking Missiles" that can only target other aircraft.
** In a reversal of the original point, at one point the player character defects from the Artemis PMC back to the US military. He does so while defending a naval group, who suggests clearing a space on their aircraft carrier for them to land, even though it's possible (and likely, given the game's suggested plane for the mission) that the player is ''not'' flying a jet capable of landing on a carrier.
** Every jet in the game with more than one variant uses the exact same model for each one, even when later variants add or remove extra seating, switch out the engines, or the like. The sole major exceptions are the F/A-18E Super Hornet, which has the proper wider fuselage than the other Hornet variants,[[note]]appropriate, since the real Super Hornet has been described as closer to a new plane advertised as a variant for the purposes of not inviting budget scrutiny[[/note]], the F-15 ACTIVE, which lengthens the fuselage to fit a second seat in the cockpit (since you first fly it in a tutorial mission where the GuyInBack is actually acknowledge; even then, it omits the thrust-vectoring engines the real thing has, and the game fails to make the same modification for the F-15E), and the Su-32 and -34, which get the widened tandem-seat cockpit and longer tail. The only other exceptions are when a variant of a plane adds canards, but that's the only difference, and if you look at the textures, you'll note that for most craft with canards, like the aforementioned Flanker family, they're lazy enough about it that canards are textured even on variants that don't have them. The game even goes overboard on this sort of thing with the Mirage V, which is accidentally programmed to use the Mirage III's texture instead of its own.
* ''Videogame/DigitalCombatSimulator'' largely averts this thanks to its very realistic cockpit and flight simulation, but the trope does pop up from time to time - some planes are modeled in a wonky way that allows them to accelerate far faster than they realistically could in a given situation, while others are able to maintain lift even when their pushed beyond what would realistically be possible given their energy-management profile.
* ''VideoGame/{{Aerobiz}}'': Though most aircraft have historically accurate phase-in and discontinuation dates, they don't feature accurate seating capacities or operational ranges. This is further exaggerated by the fact that the game does not allow airlines to make any alterations to the seating capacities or cabin configurations.
* In ''VideoGame/SwordOfTheStars II'', both the [[http://sots2.rorschach.net/File:Zuul_Shut_Shut_2.jpg Horde]] and [[http://sots2.rorschach.net/File:Liir_Shut_Shut_2.jpg Prester]] Zuul have ''rotors'' on their trans-atmospheric assault shuttles. Bad enough. But the Prester Zuul's [[http://sots2.rorschach.net/File:Liir_HvyShut_Shut_2.jpg Heavy Assault Shuttle]] has diagonally-canted rotors. There are no words.
* The ''Film/{{Transformers}}'' [[TheProblemWithLicensedGames Licensed Games]] has Dreadwing who takes the role of fighter jet enemy in the game. The problem arises because in a game that takes almost entirely in the United States,[[note]]barring the first of the Decepticon campaign which takes in an American military base in Qatar, and the BonusLevel for both that takes place on Cybertron[[/note]] their vehicle mode is a ''Russian'' [=MiG-29=]. Granted, some private companies in the States do have [=MiG-29s=] that are used as targets for training exercises, but particularly with the film's sub-plot about the US thinking the Qatar attack was done by a foreign power with Russia, North Korea, China, and later Iran in a throwaway line being named-dropped. Three guesses which fighter jet all four of those nations happen to use. [[FridgeHorror Yeah]].
** The concept artist (at least for the Transformers) of the first two games reveals he was actually [[ExecutiveMeddling barred from modeling an American fighter jet for the game]] and he only went with the [=MiG-29=] because if you squint it kinda looks an [=F-15=].
** The licensed game for ''Film/TransformersRevengeOfTheFallen'' also has this issue. While the Autobot Breakaway having the [=F-35=] Lightning II as a vehicle can be excused as it did have its first flight in 2006 and he is the only F-35 to appear in the game, and the Navy is [[ShownTheirWork properly]] using the [=F/A-18=] Hornet in the carrier fleet level, the helicopters in the game are handled with the same attention to detail. Specifically, NEST uses the [=RAH-66=] Comanche as an attack and transport helicopter. In reality, the Comanche was canceled in 2004 and, despite it having respectable firepower, was primarily meant to serve as a target spotter for the Apache. It also is incapable of carrying any passengers, let alone the three that are packed into the [[ClownCar same helicopter in one mission]]. Also, any points for the Hornets can be taken away as the same level has [=CH-53=] Super Stallions on their littoral combat ships. The Super Stallion is a Marine helicopter.
* ''VideoGame/BlazingAngels'' lets the heroic World War II pilots upgrade to flying the F-82 Twin Mustang, which first flew a month before the end of the war and didn't see combat until Korea.
* ''F/A-18 Hornet'' had you fighting Soviet [=MiG=]-27s and Su-27s in the Persian Gulf, neither of which are planes Iraq has ever flown. On the US side, the F-16 Fighting Falcon featured in later editions is sometimes seen taking off from or landing on an aircraft carrier, which it is incapable of in real life (the Navy only ''very'' briefly considered adopting a navalized variant of the F-16, the Vought Model 1600,[[note]]the US Navy does operate a handful of F-16s, but only in [[WeaponsUnderstudies adversary squadrons]], and they're emphatically ''not'' carrier-capable.[[/note]] before settling on the Northrop YF-17 instead).
* One of the playable planes in ''VideoGame/SkiesOfWar'' is a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_C-47_Skytrain C-47 Skytrain]], which is used as a medium bomber, of all things, with a missile mount and two fixed forward facing gun positions on each wing in addition to the bomb bays. While versatile and no doubt capable of such a theoretical modification, the C-47 was a cargo and paratrooper plane, with a close support variant, the AC-47 "Spooky", mounting three gun positions along the port side. This is strange, as the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_B-25_Mitchell B-25 Mitchell]] could have easily taken its place as the medium twin engined bomber.
* The American fighters attacking the ''VideoGame/{{Walker}}'' in the Berlin level are not only able to drop an enormous bomb payload, far too large for this type of plane, but even several paratroopers in one flight.
* ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquerRedAlert2'':
** The standard Allied bomber aircraft is identified by name and icon as the AV-8 Harrier, and they appear as such in cutscenes such as a mid-mission one for the second Allied mission or the introduction to the ExpansionPack, but the actual voxel art used in gameplay more resembles the A-6E Intruder, which cannot take off and land vertically as the in-game craft does; earlier in development the craft was identified as an Intruder, with the name and icon change apparently happening midway through to fit better with it acting as a VTOL aircraft.[[note]]Interestingly, the Traditional Chinese translation of the game does more or less properly call the Harrier the "Intruder" instead.[[/note]] The Aircraft Carrier also utilizes small, apparently-unmanned aircraft referred to as "Hornets", presumably meant to be the real F/A-18 Hornet despite it also being incapable of VTOL, and not even existing in a non-prototype in the game's time frame of 1972 (then again, this is a game where [[EnergyWeapon laser technology]] is utilized as a direct method of attacking hostiles in combat, so maybe it was developed earlier here).
** The introduction to ''Yuri's Revenge'' is even worse. As above the CGI models are proper Harriers, but the cockpit view showcased on a few occasions is wildly inaccurate, depicting a control panel with a pair of gauges and two or three {{Big Red Button}}s, rather than the array of ''several'' gauges and buttons that even the earliest Harrier variants had - to say nothing of the actual head-up display having apparently gone AWOL (unless we're meant to assume the in-game version has a helmet-mounted display system like the modern F-35). Then the first of the Harriers to get shot down by Yuri's {{gatling|Good}}-based defenses has one wing torn off by a neat line of bullets cutting through it, but it rolls away from the missing wing ''and'' somehow still manages to home in directly onto another still-functioning Harrier to crash into it.
* ''VideoGame/GoldenEye2010'':
** The Russian Federation does not use the Ch-53 (slightly dressed up and called the "Ludmila T1" here), as in Dam, or the AH-6, as in Tank. Granted, the former case is [[LampshadeHanging noted by Bond]], even if it's more because he can somehow tell at a glance that it looks {{EMP}}-hardened, and so one of the objectives of the level is to take pictures of it so [=MI6=] can help figure out ''why'' it's there. Also, much like the Eurocopter Tiger from the original movie it's taking the place of, the Ch-53 does not have an ejection system and cannot lock missiles onto itself (it doesn't even ''have'' missiles).
** Also, the SAM launchers in Airfield are the American MIM-23 Hawk, rather than an actual Russian system like the SA-19/SA-22. ''Reloaded'' at least adds ZU-23-2 guns that Russia actually does use, but because they weren't there in the Wii version nobody is able to actually use them here.
** Sky Briggs notes in Dubai that the pilots for the copter on display there used to fly Cobras for [[PrivateMilitaryContractors Blackwater]]. The AH-1 isn't in use with military contractors. The Blackhawk would probably be a better fit, since there is a civil variant.
* ''VideoGame/BomberCrew'' is a crew management simulator of a British Lancaster (and in a DLC campaign, an American B-17) bomber. Aside from only having a pilot with no co-pilot or auto-pilot, causing the plane to begin to plunge to the ground whenever he steps away from the controls, it also features the ability of the crew to climb ''out on the wing'' to fix damaged engines - [[RealityIsUnrealistic which did indeed happen once]], in an incident that earned [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Cyril_Jackson the sergeant involved]] a Victoria Cross and a whole forest of aluminum Christmas trees.
* The attack helicopters in ''VideoGame/GhostReconWildlands'' are repeatedly referred to as "Apaches" despite the in game models being near-perfect representations of the Cobra, the Apache's USMC counterpart and predecessor in the US Army.
* The planes in ''VideoGame/AeroFighters'', despite being based on real-life ones, tend to be... off in terms of accuracy. The Vulcan and B-2 from the first game and the second respectively are both ''way'' larger than their real-life counterparts, while the second game has a pair of militarized Concorde airliners as the boss of the Paris stage. Then again, when you consider that one of your playable pilots is a dolphin that can talk in human languages...
* In ''VideoGame/JurassicWorldEvolution'', helicopters can lift sauropod dinosaurs without a problem. There is a chopper that can lift up to 80,000 pounds, but that’s clearly not what these are, and even so, many of the sauropods in game are twice that weight.
* In ''VideoGame/BanjoPilot'', the planes that Banjo and his friends fly slow down when they fly over terrain such as grass. This would make more sense in a car racing game due to friction.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
* The large plane that serves as the mobile base for the team in ''Series/AgentsOfSHIELD'' sports a pair of engines on the tail fin, sucking in all that hot exhaust air from the wing engines.
** Also, considering how much a C-5 flares (rotates its nose up) for takeoff and landing, a pair of engines hanging ''that'' low, that far aft, would make a takeoff or landing run ''really'' interesting, for the pilots and everyone else aboard.
** As it turns out, the extra engines are necessary when the plane hovers in "The Hub". But making her a VTOL just brings up more technical problems, like insufficient thrust and structural support for the engines. AppliedPhlebotinum plus RuleOfCool is the only possible way to overcome these problems.
** In "0-8-4", the Bus makes a landing on a dirt landing strip in the jungle, kicking up much dirt and debris directly into the engine intake. FOD (Foreign Object Damage) appears not to be a consideration.
* ''Series/{{Airwolf}}'':
** All aircraft from Soviet-influenced countries are depicted as having Soviet color schemes, complete with red star.[[note]]The UsefulNotes/WarsawPact countries (as well as Cuba) had their own roundels, which could - but did not have to - incorporate red stars. For example Poland and Czechoslovakia used their pre-WWII roundels, East Germany used the black-red-yellow lozenge, and other Warsaw Pact countries used red stars, but with some variation in design - typically a miniature roundel of their national colours inside the star. (For example Romania used such star from 1950 to 1984, before reverting to the pre-WWII roundel in Romanian national colours.)[[/note]]
** The first part of the pilot has an aircraft described as a French Mirage and shown as such on the chopper's target ID screen with accurate side-drawing, but the StockFootage is of a completely different aircraft — quite possibly [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawker_Hunter the British Hawker Hunter.]] To give you an idea of the size of the error, the Hunter is two generations of fighter aircraft older, i.e. late first-generation (mid 1950s) and subsonic. The Mirage is a third-gen, late 1960s aircraft, capable of exceeding Mach 2. The Mirage also has a large, triangular "delta" wing, and looks nothing like the Hunter.
** Another episode features F-4s in service with the government of Suriana, a country in LatinLand. The F-4 was not exported to any state there and considering the instability of that country, it would not be high on the export list.
** In one episode, StockFootage of F-4s play F-16s. Rather different aircraft.
** "Fallen Angel" has [=MiG-17s=] (one tail) playing [=MiG-25s=] (much younger two-tailed aircraft). While footage of the "Foxbat" may have been hard to acquire in 1985, that's not even trying. The aircraft is described as carrying "Arid" missiles, which appears to be a misspelling of "Acrid", the reporting name for the R-40/AA-6 missiles, which the aircraft could carry.
** "Echoes of the Past" has, for some reason, an F-100 Super Sabre pop up in a shot that's meant to be of two [=MiG-19=]s. The two are similar in appearance and function (both were their country's first supersonic fighters).
** "To Snare an Airwolf" has a US satellite launch done with footage of a Saturn V launch—and the actual satellite using a clip of ''Skylab'', which had re-entered the atmosphere in 1979, five years before the episode was made.
** "Proof Through the Night" has Airwolf approach a USAF refuelling tanker, which is fine, and has the copilot asking why they're using a refuelling setup for aircraft with a refuelling probe. Several errors are made: the pilot and copilot believe the choices are a Harrier or SR-71 Blackbird, forgetting that all USN carrier aircraft use refuelling probes (the probes on the Tomcat and Hornet fold away when not in use). Secondly, they're using a "male" boom refuler, instead of the hose-and-drogue setup. The male boom plugs into the aircraft, and can't fit a refueling probe. Third, the crew is shocked to be refueling a helicopter... Except that at that time, the Air Force was deploying MH-53J Pave Low III and HH-60G Pave Hawk search and rescue choppers, which DID have refuelling probes, and were regularly refueled by USAF tankers.
* Parodied (like everything else) in ''Series/AngieTribeca''. A Boeing 767 seen at an airport terminal suddenly turns into a badly animated two-seater biplane when in the air. Interior shots show a wide-body jet, but cockpit scenes include the loud buzzing of an old prop engine. And it's so long that it takes Angie several minutes to run the length of the plane...
* The landing sequence in ''Series/TheATeam'' from the episode ''The Beast from the Belly of the Boeing'' was largely accurate for a TV show, though it did make some notable mistakes. Murdock tells Hannibal to put the plane in a shallow dive to descend, which is not what airliners generally do. A "dive" means to lower the nose of the plane without reducing engine power; the resulting maneuver sheds altitude in exchange for higher airspeed. Airliners rarely dive when descending, and certainly ''won't be losing airspeed while in a shallow dive''. Airliners generally just cut back on the engines to descend, and the reduced airspeed reduces lift and lets the plane drop (and often with spoilers partly deployed). The team also forget to deploy spoilers after touchdown, and despite being completely out of fuel Murdock tells them to reverse the thrusters, which is absolutely useless if they engine isn't producing any thrust. Also, although a Boeing 747-100/200 was used as the main plane, a few of the stock footage taxi scenes show engine nacelles from a 707.
* ''Series/BlackSheepSquadron'' used slightly-modified North American AT-6 trainer aircraft (different cockpit canopies) as Mitsubishi [=A6M=] "Zeros"/"Zekes". The AT-6 is a noticeably larger and somewhat differently-shaped aircraft than a Zero, but the masquerade was necessary because at the time, there was not a single flyable Zero fighter anywhere in the world.
** The T-6s were ones originally rebuilt to "impersonate" [=A6M2=] "Zekes" for the 1970 movie ''Tora! Tora! Tora!''. Those "Zekes" got around; they later showed up in the 1980 time-travel movie ''Film/TheFinalCountdown'', which had the nuclear carrier USS ''Nimitz'' time-warped back to the late afternoon of December 6, 1941, just west of Hawaii...
* There's a rocket example in an episode of ''Series/BlakesSeven''. Establishing model shots of the rocket are clearly based on the Russian Soyuz design, but the actual launch footage is of an American rocket. Presumably the producers were planning to use stock Soviet launch footage but either couldn't get it or thought it was of insufficient quality.
* In ''Series/TheComicStripPresents'' episode "Four Men in a Plane", our heroes take off for the middle east in a four-engined airliner, but when they land it's only got two engines. It's not the plane of the title, by the way — that is a single-engined light aircraft.
* ''Series/DarkSkies'' used a Redstone-Mercury to represent a Gemini launch despite Gemini stock footage being widely available.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
** In TheSixties, the show seemed to use rocket stock footage in every other serial. This dropped off in later years, but didn't die off completely until nearly the end of the original run. There's also the Vogan "Skystriker" missile from [[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E5RevengeOfTheCybermen "Revenge of the Cybermen"]], which is obviously a US Saturn V. And by "obviously" we mean it has "USA" painted on the side in big, easily legible letters.
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E3VictoryOfTheDaleks "Victory of the Daleks"]] is set during the London Blitz in 1941, but has Spitfire Mk [=IXs=], which were introduced in 1942. They should have been Mk II or [=IIIs=], which flew in the Battle of Britain.
** In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E13TheBigBang "The Big Bang"]], there is a scene showing a small video reel showing the journey of the Pandorica from Stonehenge to London. The video ends with the Blitz in 1941. The "German" bombers shown in the clip are actually American B-17 Flying Fortresses — in fact, the closest bomber has the American, ''1943-45 vintage'' USAAF roundel on the wing.
* ''Series/FatherTed'', "Flight into Terror":
** External shots show a [=BAe=] 146, but interior shots are of a wide-body aircraft.
** The priests find two parachutes and hold a 'Why Should I Win A Parachute' contest. Real passenger planes don't carry parachutes.
** There appears to be only one pilot onboard.
** When they're in the cockpit, the engine gauges are mentioned. The plane is a two-engined jet, but the pilot mentions 'engine three'.
** In the climax, Jack manages to open the cabin door in mid-air and jump out with the drink cart. Ted later climbs out the cabin door onto the fuselage. Both scenes are impossible due to the design of cabin doors. A more likely scenario is Jack struggling to open the door and being found by the priests.
* In the second season of ''Series/TheGreatestAmericanHero'', an episode called, ''The Hand-Painted Thai'' had scenes from the Vietnam War that were supposed to be taking place in 1970. In one of the scenes, you see an F-16 dropping bombs. The problem is that the F-16 never saw service in Vietnam. In fact, the F-16's first flight wasn't until a few years ''after'' this scene was supposed to take place.
* The military-legal show ''Series/{{JAG}}'' has many examples of this trope in practically every episode dealing with aircraft. There was a scene where some attack chopper was supposed to be firing machine guns. The noise was right, but the heli was really firing rockets from a pod. They were probably used in place of the guns because machine guns firing look quite boring in real life, as opposed to foot-long flaming "bullets". Oh, and here's a suggestion: if playing a ''JAG'' DrinkingGame, drinking whenever a plane changes model in flight will get you drunk quick smart.
** At least one episode used stock footage from ''Film/TopGun'' of the "MiG-28" claiming it to be a North Korean fighter.
* Particularly jarring in ''Series/Jericho2006'', where the main character reports seeing a Tupolev "Bear" and some escorts, when the plane in question is clearly is a C-130 Hercules, the single longest-produced ''American'' military aircraft of all time.
* In the intro sequence of the ''Series/KamenRiderDouble'' [[TheMovie movie]] ''A-to-Z The Gaia Memories of Destiny'', we see Katsumi Daido (soon-to-be Kamen Rider Eternal) hijacking a Foundation X helicopter in mid-air to steal their T2 Gaia Memories. The problem is, while the interior shots are of a normal civilian helicopter, which makes sense, the CGI exterior shots of the heli are of a freaking AH-64 Apache, which has no business being a transport vehicle for civilians. It's likely they just reused a 3D model they had lying around, since a similar CG Apache appears in the OriginStory scene where Shotaro and Philip transform into Double for the first time.
* ''Series/{{Leverage}}'' falls into this fairly frequently. The most obvious case is in "The Mile High Job" which centers a round a plane flight. The establishing shot of LAX uses some StockFootage which prominently displays a TWA airliner (TWA was bought out by American in 2001). On the flight, they have Parker giving the safety spiel (on just about any plane with an entertainment system, this is given by a video[[hottip:*:to ensure it's exactly the same every time in case anyone asks pointed questions later like "are you SURE the cabin crew told passengers their seat cushions could be used as a flotation device?"]]), and the plane itself seems to be a 777 with the wings of an A330.
* ''Literature/TheMachineGunners'':
** Bizarrely, Creator/TheBBC's TV adaptation changes the downed bomber from which the machine gun is stolen from a Heinkel He 111 to a Junkers Ju 52. Guess which one of these German aircraft ''wasn't'' in service as a bomber during 1941.
** The source novel explains that the tail section of the He 111 broke off and crashed into the woods after the rest of the aircraft crashed into the laundry. Since the dorsal gun on a He 111 is located relatively far forward on the aircraft there is no way the tail section of this aircraft could break off and still contain the gun position. While the Ju 52 used in the TV series was clearly incorrect for the time period, at least it had the gun position in the 'correct' spot for the plot to actually work.
* A ''Series/MagnumPI'' two-parter had a "prototype attack helicopter" be hijacked [[spoiler:by a {{Manchurian Agent}}ified T.C. and his Soviet handler]]. The chopper is blatantly a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MD_Helicopters_MD_500 McDonnell Douglas MD 500]] with rockets bolted on, i.e. [[FridgeLogic the same model of chopper that T.C. flies in his day job]]. Not ''quite'' as bad as it could be, though, given the MD 500 is a civilian variant of the OH-6 Cayuse, which saw combat in Vietnam.
* ''Series/{{Manifest}}'' has the main characters flying aboard a Boeing 737 Next Generation before [[spoiler:vanishing from the face of the Earth for more than five years. When it lands, not only have five years inexplicably passed, the plane has also inexplicably become a much older 737 Classic.]]
* ''Series/{{Mayday}}'' has a tendency to fall into this.
** One example is in the episode "Bomb on Board", which recycles the same clip for taking off and landing ''with the thrust reversers deployed.''
** Another episode about the Tenerife disaster, which involved a collision between two 747s, Pan Am and KLM, introduces the KLM plane with a shot of it in flight... with winglets, identifying it as a 747-400, which would not be in production until 11 years after the disaster in 1977.
** In another episode, it is made clear that the people making the show believe that any twinjet in an American Airlines livery must be an A300.
** The above is averted in the episode about American Airlines Flight 587, which actually did involve an A300, but instead it goofs in showing the plane pitching downward when it loses its vertical stabilizer; in real life, losing the vertical stabilizer (i.e. the part of the tail that points straight upwards) causes uncontrollable movements in the ''yaw'' axis, as in the plane wants to drift from side-to-side like how a car turns. It's both baffling, in that the episode about the Uberlingen disaster correctly showed the effects of losing the vertical stabilizer, but also darkly amusing, in that this trope (specifically, training pilots to dangerously overreact to the wake turbulence that caused the vertical stabilizer to separate) contributed to the real AA 587 crash.
* In the ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' episode "Agent Afloat", an F/A-18 on USS ''Seahawk'' switches to an F-14 between shots. The F-14 had retired from USN service before the episode was made.
** The first season episode "High Seas" features a US Navy SH-60 Seahawk quite clearly crewed by Australians.
* ''Jetstream'', a documentary series on the training of Canadian fighter pilots, constantly has the announcer refer to the aircraft as the "F-18 Hornet". That was the original designation, but only Finland appears to use it. The US calls it the F/A-18 and the Canadian single-seater version is officially the CF-188A, but more usually called the CF-18A.
** This is technically an error, but a forgivable one, as almost no one (even its pilots) bothers calling it the F/A-18 in colloquial speech. This is common with other aircraft that have complex or unpopular official tri-service designations. Generally, when referring to these aircraft, people will use the shorter (but technically incorrect) designation, or its common service name. For example, almost no one calls the A-10 the "Thunderbolt II". It is universally known as either the A-10, or the "hawg" or "warthog". The "F/A-18 Hornet" is more commonly known as "the bug" or "the plastic bug", etc.
* Averted when Creator/DonaldPBellisario actually did do the research for the pilot episode of ''Series/QuantumLeap''. He went scouting for a Bell X-2, only to presumably be told that both the X-2s were destroyed in crashes so he'd have to make a replica. The full-scale fiberglass replica he had built is on display at Chino airport's Planes of Fame air museum, unfortunately quite worse for the weather since it's been stored outside for years, sans wings.
* The USS ''Pike'' in ''Series/{{Salvation}}'' has a [[https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/9QaehQ3qRy5u-0o0QEspw9GWzCC__gClQWSYIe21z65F53L3MbsuSOmHL9A12K_uS8pVO84iL2rLrh5G56gBZ0PFrRm1_MxO9uNXh7-nIPThiSQsP5Pf3C0OJrVC0xRRTVrqwx2UEA=w919-h623-no motley collection]] of aircraft, all of which do not belong on an American carrier. The only American craft are a US Coast Guard chopper and US Air Force F-22s and A-10s, the latter two of which can't land on carriers. Neither can the Eurofighter or non-navalized Russian [=MiG=]-29s. Also present is a French Army Caracal helicopter.
* In ''Series/SEALTeam'' season 2's penultimate episode, Bravo Team is evacuated out of Pakistan by an Indian Air Force UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter. Except the Indian Air Force doesn't use Blackhawks; their helicopters are almost all Russian or indigenous designs. American helicopters only began to enter the IAF's inventory in late 2019, and the first models to be delivered to India were the AH-64 Apache and CH-47 Chinook.
* In the TV-movie ''Series/TheSixMillionDollarMan'', Steve Austin goes up in an HL-10 lifting body, but crashes in an M2-F2. [[note]]This is because the crash is ''real'': pilot Bruce Peterson was very badly injured but survived, though he did not receive any bionic upgrades.[[/note]]
** In a later episode of the TV series, he pilots what's supposed to be the same aircraft yet again. This time, they show a Bell X-2 rocket plane. In the script, Steve Austin calls the plane the "X-PJ-1" (perhaps the script writer was wearing pajamas at the time).
** In another episode of the TV series, he's shown taking off in an F-4 Phantom II, flying around in a Northrop F-5, and landing in an F-104 Star Fighter. This scene was supposedly showing a single flight.
** In yet another episode, Steve identifies a fighter (an F-94) by the engine note alone (supposedly realistic, too).
* ''Series/{{Smallville}}'' once featured a character taking a trip by private jet. When shown on the ground it was a Bae 125. The shot of it en route showed it had suddenly acquired a third engine and looked like a Falcon 50. It then got into trouble and plummeted Earthwards and turned into a Cessna before coming to rest as wreckage that looked like a Lear.
* The final episode of ''Series/Studio60OnTheSunsetStrip'' has off-screen F-14s scrambling out of Bagram in Afghanistan. The F-14 had been retired before the episode was made; even if they'd still been active, they would have been far more likely to have been scrambled from a nearby aircraft carrier than flying from a land base. It's doubtful any F-14s ever operated out of Bagram.
* In addition to lifting scenes from ''Destination Moon'', the second episode of ''Series/TheTimeTunnel'' used an Atlas rocket to represent the launch of a mission to Mars.
* Entirely averted on ''Series/TopGear'', due in large part to 1. presenter James May holding a private pilot's license in his own right and being a total aviation nerd (witness his excitement at finding the Albanian [=MiG=] boneyard -- "It's a two seater version from the Korean war... I believe that will have been built in China") and 2. the coolness of certain stunts being based on the performance of a car vs. the legitimate capabilities of [insert name of CoolPlane or Cool Helicopter here].
* Averted in the ''[[Series/TheTwilightZone1959 Twilight Zone]]'' episode "The Odyssey of Flight 33". Creator/RodSerling used his brother Robert, who was an aviation writer, and an airline-pilot friend as sources for the cockpit dialogue.
* ''Series/WhiteRabbitProject'': In the "Crazy UsefulNotes/WorldWarII Weapons" episode, Tory says the proposed bat bombs were to be dropped by B-52s, which were only conceived after the war's end, and wouldn't see service until 1955. The plan actually called for B-24s.
%%* Major Steve Trevor in ''[[Series/WonderWoman1975 Wonder Woman]]'' was the test pilot for another "X-PJ-1".
[[/folder]]

!!Examples:

[[folder:Film]]
* ''Film/TopGun'':
** The US built [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_F-5 F-5E Tiger II]] stood in for [=MiGs=], just as various models of Sikorsky helicopters with wings stuck on have had to stand in for Soviet/Russian Mi-24 "Hind" gunships. And the aircraft was called a [=MiG=]-28 — no such bird exists due to naming conventions.[[note]]Mikoyan have always built fighters. Back in the Cold War days, in addition to indicating the design bureau ("[=MiG=]", "Su", "Tu", "Yak", etc.), Soviet designations made the distinction between fighters and other aircraft; odd numbers were fighters, even ones bombers and everything else (though with specialized ground attack aircraft like the Su-25, the difference did get fuzzy at times, and the iconic "Bear" four-engine heavy bomber inexplicably ended up with the Tu-95 designation, used internally by the design bureau, instead of the official Tu-20 designation issued by the Red Air Force). So there was a [=MiG-27=] and a [=MiG-29=], but no -28. There was at the time no [=MiG-33 or -35=] (the former was a WorkingTitle for the [=MiG-29, the latter a MiG-29=] variant that didn't fly until 2007), so either of these names would've been better for a fictional [=MiG=].[[/note]] Additionally, there were no fixed-wing Soviet naval aircraft in service at the time other than the Yak-38, an underpowered Harrier knock-off.[[note]]It was supposed to just be a technology demonstrator for VTOL but Soviet Premier Leonid Brezhnev ordered it built as a production fighter for no adequately explained reason.[[/note]] This may be [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality somewhat justified]], since the alternative of calling the Tigers by the name of a ''real'' Soviet plane would arguably be worse--though one plane that ''could'' have been used here would have been the Soviet Air Force [=MiG-29=] and [=MiG-31=], which kind of looks like an F-15 if you squint. (The US ''did'' actually have real [=MiGs=] at the time, but they were classified.)
** A pilot uses the missile release button on his control stick to fire his guns, instead of the bright red gun trigger clearly visible any time one of the pilots is shown jerking the stick for a violent maneuver.
** The pilots evidently gain a missile lock by flying the lead-calculating reticle for the gun onto the target. Suffice it to say, anything in the missile seeker head's field of view (i.e. anything in front of the plane) can be locked simply by selecting the target and letting the missile's software do its thing for about a second, and on an F-14 would be done by the [[GuyInBack RIO]], not the pilot.
*** Additionally, the lock tones vary depending on the missile used. Radar-guided missiles like the AIM-7 Sparrow, AIM-120 AMRAAM, or the now-retired AIM-54 Phoenix (which only the F-14 could carry) indicate a lock with a continuous low-pitch ringing tone. For the AIM-9 Sidewinder, it's a continuous low-pitched "growl." The movie's "beep-beep-beep-beep-''booooooop''" is never heard in a real cockpit.
** In the climactic dogfight, Iceman is hit twice by enemy cannon fire, both times leaving a short, neat line of holes in his plane. In reality, fighter cannons fire in bursts of 100 rounds or so to facilitate use in high-speed engagements. A solid hit to the fuselage as depicted, let alone ''two'', would almost certainly have destroyed Iceman's plane. And, of course, cannon shells have explosives inside; that's what makes the gun a cannon!
** Most of the school/practice battles in ''Top Gun'' have planes within rock-throwing distance of each other, an astoundingly unsafe situation as well as being too close for missiles, sensors, guns, and engines to work any more. The plot-crucial engine flameout should've happened about twenty times before it did. Remember that your plane's engine(s) can't breathe exhaust any better than you can. This was {{enforced}} by the filmmakers: the Navy at one point asked the crew to at least ''try'' shooting air combat at realistic distances, but the result was that nobody could see anything on film.
** The [=A-4=] Skyhawks flown by the Top Gun trainers like Viper and Jester are described as being ''faster'' than the [=F-14s=] flown by the students. The [=A-4=] was a subsonic ground attack plane first flown in ''1954''. Even the later variants produced by the time of the film were incapable of supersonic flight except in a dive. The Tomcat has a maximum speed of ~Mach 2.3. They also have much lower thrust to weight ratios than the F-14 as well and thus lower acceleration as well.
** To say pilot chatter in the final battle is laughably inaccurate would be an understatement.
** In the final battle a rescue helicopter is dispatched to pick up one of the F-14 crews 150 miles from the carrier, which is roughly that helicopter's top speed. By the time the battle is finished and Maverick/Iceman land their planes, the helicopter should be just arriving at the crash site, not returning with them.
* ''Film/TopGunMaverick''
** The sequel repeats the predecessor's mistakes with fighter cannons acting like machine guns and [[SeeTheWhitesOfTheirEyes absurdly short combat ranges]], though the latter is mitigated by the fact that the pilots are practicing for and then implementing an extremely low-altitude AirstrikeImpossible mission. Additionally, the film uses CGI Sukhoi-57s to represent the "fifth-generation fighters" of the again-unnamed enemy country. While this is better than the WeaponsUnderstudies approach of the original film, at time of release, only 16 Su-57s had been built due to TroubledProduction and Russia's financial issues, ten of which were test models and the other six being in Russian Air Force hands.
** {{Enforced}} with the choice to use the F/A-18 Super Hornet in the film over the F-35C Lightning II. The InUniverse reason for this choice is that the target is protected by GPS jamming. This is [[{{Handwave}} a fairly threadbare excuse]]: the F-35C is quite capable of using the same laser-guided munitions that were employed in the film, and its stealth features would make the approach significantly easier. The [[RealLifeWritesThePlot real-world reason]] is that the F-35C is unsuitable for filming actors in a real aircraft because it doesn't come in a two-seat model ''a la'' the F/A-18F (which Phoenix and Payback fly in the film),[[note]]A few foreign buyers including Israel have proposed creating a two-seat variant of the F-35A, but the US Navy is the only customer for the navalized C variant: only the US, France, and China operate CATOBAR aircraft carriers, all of whom build their own naval aircraft.[[/note]] and that the Navy couldn't spare any for filming since they had only entered service in February 2019.
* ''Film/AirForceOne'':
** The titular presidential VC-25 features an ''{{escape pod}}'', something that the real plane used as UsefulNotes/AirForceOne does not, and could not possibly, have. [[UsefulNotes/BillClinton President Clinton]] is said to have commented on that inaccuracy when watching the movie.
** One scene featured some F-15s switching on their afterburners. This caused these fighter jets to ''instantly'' jump from subsonic speeds to Mach 2, like Han Solo turning on the hyperdrive. Real afterburners simply provide a greater force of thrust, allowing the aircraft to ''smoothly accelerate'' past the compressibility range until it attains a supersonic airspeed—they don't cause Newton's 2nd Law of Motion to be temporarily suspended.
** Also regarding the Eagles, they repeatedly get missile locks with the Sparrow and AMRAAM radar-homing missiles at ranges far too ''close'' for the missile to guide properly. This doesn't apply to the enemy [=MiG=]-29 Fulcrums, because they were firing infra-red homing AA-8 "Aphid" and AA-10 "Alamo-B" missiles at [=AF1=]. They were just about at the known minimum distance for those missiles.
** When [=AF1=] charges through Ramstein AFB after the failed landing attempt, it not only wouldn't have gotten back in the air, it would have been torn apart by the overstressing of the landing gear and wings. 747s, especially military E-4s and VC-25s, are tough, but they're not ''that'' tough.
** During the same scene, the terrorist trying to get [=AF1=] back in the air is steering around Ramstein by turning the yoke like a steering wheel. Airplanes move on their horizontal axis by pushing foot pedals. If turning the yoke like that would have actually worked, the wings would have smacked the ground.
** When the refueling attempt results in a fire involving the KC-10's "flying boom", it would not cause the Extender to explode. They have fuel cutoffs and fire-suppression equipment built into the refueling system to prevent just such an accident. In fact, it's been standard on all USAF tankers since the midair collision between the KC-135 and B-52 that dropped five (still-safed) H-bombs around Palomares, Spain in 1965. That accident began when the two aircraft "bumped" during an in-flight refueling exercise. The Air Force tries not to make the same mistake ''twice''.
* Done deliberately in ''Film/{{Airplane}}'' where the titular jet is accompanied by a propeller sound effect which is both incongruous and a ShoutOut to ''Zero Hour'', the B-movie it was based on. The directors did this because the studio wouldn't allow them to use a propeller-drive aircraft.
* ''Film/IronEagle'': The lower-budget Air Force knockoff of ''Film/TopGun'' that, unlike the latter, wasn't {{backed by the Pentagon}}? But of course:
** The first movie has a scene in which a motorbike races against a Cessna 152 which obviously has full flap deployed and the throttle almost closed. Given that the Cessna cruises at around 107 knots, almost 200 km/h, this was necessary to make the contest look even remotely fair.
** The movie also has Kfirs play as [=MiG=]-23s, a rather glaring error since [=MiG=]-23s are swing-wing, whereas Kfirs are delta-wing. This gets noteworthy when you consider that some {{Real Life}} Arab nations operated Mirage V fighters, which the IAI Kfir is visually almost indiscernible from, being an upgrade of an unlicensed copy of the Mirage V - so why not the [[{{Qurac}} Bilyan Air Force]]?[[note]]Then again, the Marine Corps ''also'' leased Kfirs from the IAF to stand in for [=MiG-23=]s in dissimilar air combat training (solely because of its similar flight characteristics - the only ''visual'' similarity was the "Flogger" paint scheme DACT Kfirs were given), which could be where the producers got the idea from.[[/note]]
** The F-16s were provided by the Israeli Air Force, and while sporting American national insignia and USAF-like markings, they retained Israeli green-sand-brown camouflage on upper surfaces, which is ''very'' different from the USAF (or almost any other F-16 operator's) gray color scheme.
** In ''Iron Eagle II'', one of the heroes hears planes approaching, starts screaming and yelling "...they're goddamned Soviet [=MiGs=]!" and runs out onto the tarmac -- to look at a flight of F-4 Phantom [=IIs=], one of the most distinctive American designs out there. The differences between the [=MiG-29=] and the F-4 are glaring from the side and rear ([=MiG=]-29s are twin tailed while F-4s are single tailed), but perhaps from the front they looked similar enough to justify their use (i.e. the droopy nose and twin intakes[[note]]ignore the very different shape and placement of said intakes[[/note]]).
** In Iron Eagle IV, the protagonist is shot down by "[=MiG=]-29s" (again, played by F-4 Phantoms)... carrying ''air to '''ground''''' Maverick missiles.
* F-4 Phantoms also stood in for [=MiG=]-21s in ''Film/IceStationZebra'', at least during shots where actual aircraft were used - shots filmed using miniatures used models of actual [=MiG=]-21s.
* UsefulNotes/TheKoreanWar drama ''The Hunters'' uses repainted F-84F Thunderstreaks (which entered service too late to see action in Korea, though previous versions with unswept wings did) to play [=MiG-15s=]. Those -84s have been popularly known as "[=ThunderMiGs=]" ever since.
* In ''Film/WarGames'', General Beringer's order to "scramble two F-16s [single engine, one tail and rather small] out of Galena" in response to a phantom Soviet bomber apparently gets garbled somewhere along the way: the aircraft seen moments later are unmistakably F-15s [two engines, two tails and markedly larger than the F-16].
** In the early 1980s, when the movie was made, the air force unit likely operating from Galena, Alaska, was the 21st Tactical Fighter Wing (headquartered at Elmendorf AFB, which exercised control over the airfield at Galena as well), part of the 11th Air Force. At this time, 21st TFW was indeed operating the F-15A, having transitioned to the type from F-4 Phantoms in 1982.
* The [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messerschmitt_Bf_108 Messerschmitt [=Bf108=] Taifun]] trainer shows up playing German fighters in several 1960s war films, notably ''633 Squadron'', ''Film/VonRyansExpress'' and ''Film/TheLongestDay''. The [=Bf108=] is a relatively common civil aircraft (they continued to be built in France after the war as the Nord 1000) that bears an unmistakable family resemblence to the [=Bf109=] fighter.
* The above is notably averted in ''Film/TheGreatEscape'' where a [=Bf108=] is actually used to portray the [=Bf108=] which two of the escapees steal from a training field.
* Harvards (better known as T-6 Texans or [=SNJs=]) with bits glued on were used to represent fighter bombers in ''A Bridge Too Far''. [[AvertedTrope The C-47s used for that film were real C-47s, however]]. [[WildMassGuessing Or possibly repainted DC-3s]], which are basically the same thing.
** Virtually all DC-3s ever built were actually C-47s. 600 DC-3s were built before the war by Douglas; after the war the surviving majority of the nearly ''fifteen thousand'' C-47s were sold into civilian service, saturating the market for twin-engine propeller airliners.
* The movie ''Film/MemphisBelle'' is another example of an intensive effort being made to bring together actual vintage aircraft for an accurate filming; in that movie's case, most of the world's surviving B-17s. Note you never see more than 3 actual (as opposed to models or CGI) B-17s at a time. If one watches carefully, you can at times see that many of the bombers have two separate sets of nose art and markings — one on each side of the fuselage — allowing each plane to play two different bombers in the formation.
** P-51 escorts are glimpsed in the aerial battle scenes; they did not arrive in-theater until November 1943, six months after the film's date in May. Moreover, they have to turn back halfway through the trip, which is ridiculous because the entire reason they took over the role of bomber escort in reality was because they ''did'' have the range to escort a B-17 all the way to Germany and back.
* ''Film/PearlHarbor'':
** At one point in the eponymous battle, a character states that "We can't outrun Zeros, we'll have to out-fly them!" The American P-40 could easily outrun the Zero, but didn't have a prayer if they tried to out-turn the Zero, one of the most amazingly maneuverable (but relatively slow) fighter aircraft of the war. Note however that U.S. Airmen were remarkably ignorant about the Zero's capabilities in 1941; accurate reports out of China were dismissed as exaggerated. About the only correct thing they did know about the Zero was its "Type 00" designation, the "Zeke" ReportingName not being issued until late 1942. And the Zero wasn't that much slower than the P-40 in level flight, only in a dive. Basically, P-40s taking off under fire, in a low-energy state (low and slow) would be torn apart by Zeroes...which is exactly what happened in real life.
** In addition, the CGI P-40s' control surfaces didn't move. Possibly the other aircraft too, but there were a number of gratuitous beauty shots of the P-40s that made it obvious.
** They got actual flying Zeroes with the proper engines and everything - then painted them ''with Imperial Army markings.'' The Japanese army ''never'' flew the Mitsubishi [=A6M=], instead favoring the lighter, even more maneuverable, Nakajima [=Ki-43=], called the ''Hayabusa'' (Peregrine Falcon) by the Japanese and [[ReportingNames "Oscar"]] by the Allies. Moreover, the Zeroes present in the attack on Pearl Harbor (when they're not shifting into [=D3A1=] "Val" dive-bombers between camera angles) are painted green; the real Imperial Japanese Navy painted Zeroes grey in 1941, with the green paint scheme not being used until '43. %%Which army markings are they given, American or Japanese?
** The B-25s for the Doolittle raid are wrong too - in several scenes they have the dorsal turrets well towards the front as in all B-25s past the G model. The Doolittle raid used the earlier B model; the B-25G was not produced until a year after the raid. Also, while the B-25 is a fairly easy aircraft to fly, the real pilots/copilots were all experienced multi-engine bomber pilots with hundreds of hours in [=B-25s=] and a thorough knowledge of exactly how they flew and handled under every imaginable condition, not single-engine fighter pilots who didn't even bother with Type-Transition training. The takeoff sequence includes a dramatic scene of a B-25 dropping below view and almost crashing before lifting up. With one exception, every B-25 was lifting off before reaching the end of the flight deck (the one exception had the flaps set incorrectly), due to the aircraft carrier travelling at 25 MPH into a 40 MPH headwind; the B-25 has a stall speed of 80 MPH, meaning they only needed an additional speed of 15 MPH to take off.
** The "Battle of Britain" scene is full of glaring errors. The Spitfires used are clearly Mk.V or Mk.IX Spits, the former of which did not reach frontline service until 1941, by which time large-scale air raids such as the one depicted would have ceased. The cannons are a dead giveaway, especially since the Hispano II cannon was not introduced until 1941 either. Secondly, they are all marked with "RF", designation of No. 303 Squadron, one of the most prominent ''Polish'' squadrons in the Battle, yet here, there are multiple American and British pilots! Regarding the American pilots, only seven were officially active during the Battle, anyway, and they would likely have been split between several squadrons. At one point, an He-111's cockpit ''explodes'' after being hit with just a single shell. Moreover, none of the Spitfire pilots are actually wearing their oxygen masks, which contain their microphones, so any communication would be incredibly difficult. When Affleck fires his guns, he ''only'' uses the cannons despite standard practice being to correct your aim using expendable machinegun fire before spending cannon shells. The Bf-109s that attack them are clearly not the standard Bf-109 E, since the Bf-109 E had distinct flattened wingtips not seen on the plane in the film. A lot of the fighting is done at obscenely close range, when in reality, RAF standard procedure was to open fire between 250 and 500 yards (200m to 400m) from their target, though the Free Polish airmen of 303 Squadron were noted for being more aggressive and got in closer. (The legend at the time was that British pilots generally wanted to shoot down their German opponents, while the Polish exiles wanted to ''kill'' them. In reality, it was because the Poles were trained to get much closer before opening fire because the Polish air force flew much slower aircraft, but it gave them such a reputation for fearsomeness the legend went uncontested.)
* In the film ''Film/FailSafe'', planes are ordered to hit their afterburners. The film then cuts to stock footage of what is clearly a bunch of planes firing missiles instead.
* In the first Hollywood remake of ''Film/{{Godzilla|1998}}'', the military aircraft are portrayed inaccurately:
** Apache helicopters have fixed, side-mounted guns (as opposed to the swiveling nose-mounted gun of a real Apache) and Sidewinder anti-aircraft heat seeking missiles - while the Apache ''can'' mount them, they never do, since in any engagements where the Apache would be expected to carry air-to-air munitions for defending against other aerial targets, it makes more sense to carry four AIM-92 Stingers rather than two Sidewinders.
*** The Apaches in the film also have longer stub-wing pylons, each with an extra hardpoint mounting two more Hydra rocket pods, as well as a span-like structure going from the engine cowlings to the wing pylons, giving them a rather strange Hind-like front profile.
** Towards the end of the film, Godzilla is attacked by an F/A-18 using Harpoon anti-ship missiles. While Godzilla may be large enough for a radar guided missile like the Harpoon to lock onto, the missile would certainly not work over land. [[note]]This is because land, being full of solid stuff, creates a very chaotic radar picture. By comparison the ocean is quite flat and smooth and makes it pretty easy for a missile to find a target, necessitating a rather different seeker design.[[/note]] There is a land attack version of the Harpoon that would be well suited for a target like Godzilla, but it entered service two years after the movie was released.
** In the follow-up strike on the "hatchlings" at Madison Square Garden, the cockpit dialogue regarding the missiles is even more inaccurate. The lead pilot states they are using the laser (designator) and "going with [=LGBs=]" (Laser-Guided Bombs, aka "Paveways") - but the weapon select display clearly shows and says "Harpoon Armed". Then, just before launching, he says, "Use the Mavericks" - which is an entirely different air-to-surface missile. What come "off the rails" on all three Hornets, though, are indeed Harpoons.
* ''Film/TheLastKingOfScotland'' has Israeli hostages at Entebbe rescued using a Soviet-built An-12 transport plane. The actual operation used American C-130s.
* Film/JamesBond:
** In ''Film/YouOnlyLiveTwice'', for an American Gemini rocket launch they used stock footage of an Atlas-Agena (probably carrying a weather satellite) despite having stock footage of a Gemini - which they used for a ''Soviet'' rocket launch.
** ''Film/{{Moonraker}}''. The sequence in which a space shuttle blasts off from the aircraft carrying it.
*** The shuttle is never carried with fuel or live batteries. Even if Drax somehow arranged for them to be onboard, the Shuttle is basically a glider -- its engine and onboard fuel aren't enough to fly it any great distance as if it were a regular jet plane.
*** It is also impossible to carry a shuttle on the back of a normal 747, even if you could add a cradle on top. The turbulence caused by it renders the normal rudder basically useless (the NASA 747 used to ferry the shuttles had additional vertical steering surfaces installed at the ends of the horizontal tail surfaces for this reason). The other problems can be hand-waved with this being something more like an earlier design, which included air-breathing jet engines with a significant internal fuel store. You'd still never get enough fuel on board it without it being noticed to be overweight when it was loaded on the carrier, or at the very least when the carrier was being pre-flighted and the crew noticed the landing gear was reading thousands of pounds more weight than it should be. Additionally, if the shuttle firing its engines while attached to the 747 causes the latter to explode, why does the 747 have an indicator in the cockpit for 'Shuttle Ignition' as if they were ''expecting it to happen sometime''?
** ''Film/GoldenEye''
*** The real Eurocopter Tiger cannot survive an EMP and cannot lock missiles onto itself. The MC at the demonstration where it is stolen announces it as a prototype with new features.
*** The [=MiG=] pilot killed when his unresponsive aircraft augurs in after the first EMP (hammering his fist on the canopy in a vain attempt to escape) should have pulled his ejection handle. Aircraft ejection seats are specifically designed to function with no power source of any kind, and are largely immune to EMP, the phenomenon being reasonably well-understood as an effect of nuclear weapons detonations. Even systems with electronic initiation have a backup system. As a rule, much more concern is spent making sure the ejection seat doesn't go off when it ''shouldn't'', such as when the plane is on the ground.
** ''Film/TomorrowNeverDies''
*** The Chinese planes that attack the stray British ship are repeatedly described as "Chinese [=MiGs=]". Although China does have [=MiGs=], these aren't them; the aircraft are clearly recognizable as Q-5s, an indigenous Chinese type (admittedly partly based on [=MiG-19=] technology, but very different in appearance). Apparently a case of the special effects department doing better research than the scriptwriters.
*** And a Qian-5 that drops a torpedo would be an extraordinary beast. They should have used the Chinese Harbin-5 bomber, based on the Ilyushin-28.
*** In the teaser, when the Royal Navy frigate fires the cruise missile at the terrorist "flea market", M tells 007 he has four minutes to get clear. The target is 400 miles from the ship. A Tomahawk cruise missile (as shown) has a top speed of about 550 miles per hour. It should have taken the missile about ''43'' minutes to get there. The novelization blows it even more thoroughly, with a Harpoon missile being launched, and traveling ''800'' miles in 4 minutes 8 seconds. First of all, a Harpoon (an ''antiship'' missile) has a maximum range of less than 100 miles, and second, it travels at about the same (determinedly subsonic) speed as the Tomahawk. To do 800 miles in 248 seconds, it would have needed to achieve about 11,600 miles per hour, or about 3.2 miles per second - about half of Earth's ''escape velocity''. Also, any object traveling that fast at low altitude would burn up like a meteor hitting the lower atmosphere - plus what the shock wave effects would do to anything along its path on the ''ground''.
** ''Film/{{Casino Royale|2006}}''
*** One scene features a prototype "Skyfleet S570", possibly intended as a BlandNameProduct version of the then-new Airbus A380. The actual plane we see, however, is obviously a Boeing 747 (specifically, the decommissioned 747 that lives on the ''Series/TopGear'' test track) with external fuel tanks hanging from the wings, which makes very little sense for any civilian aircraft.
*** Also, a Czech Airlines plane is seen. That airline did not operate flights to Miami in 2006 (no doubt due to the scene being filmed at Vaclav Havel Airport in Prague, where the airline is based).
** ''ForYourEyesOnly'' has a minor example. In the opening James Bond flies a helicopter with both hands on the same stick, a so-called cyclic stick (for directional control). He would need one hand to operate the collective/throttle lever. (Averted later on: contrary to most Cold War movies, the helicopter that transports General Gogol is an actual Polish-made [=MiL=] Mi-6, accurate for a Russian general in the early 1980s.)
** ''Film/{{Thunderball}}'' makes a couple errors with the plot-important Avro Vulcan strategic bomber.
*** The Vulcan only has a range of 2600 miles. Even assuming the jet was fully fueled when it was hijacked, that puts Fake Derval ditching in the Atlantic 1600 miles short of the Bahamas (where the bombs would have been both unrecoverable due to depth, and well beyond the range of helicopter searches from the Nassau area). The Vulcan famously ''did'' make 4,000 mile round trips several times during the Falklands War about twenty years after this film (traveling from Ascension Island to strike the Argentine-held Port Stanley airfield), but it required midair refueling.
*** When Bond dives the sunken Vulcan bomber, he enters the cockpit through a small door via the bomb bay. It is not possible to access the bomb bay of a Vulcan from the cockpit due to being separated by bulkheads, the nose gear and a fuel tank.
* ''Franchise/DieHard''
** ''Film/LiveFreeOrDieHard'''s F-35 sequence. [[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0337978/goofs Just look at the list of goofs.]] The F-35 is shown with two guns, when it really has one (and they haven't been able to make that one gun work yet). It also uses its VTOL capacity to make a hovering attack. You ''could'' do this, but you'd run out of fuel really fast. Also, in a few HUD shots, the MASTER-ARM is set switched to SIM, which means the F-35 couldn't actually fire its gun or missiles.
** ''Film/DieHard2'' (i.e. [[DieHardOnAnX Die Hard in an Airport]]) [[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099423/trivia?tab=gf also features plenty of this.]]
* ''Film/IndependenceDay'': RAF-marked F-16s in Iraq? The ''Air Force'' using F/A-18s in the climactic battle at the end? The Israeli Air Force (IAF) with F/A-18 Hornets??
** If you freeze-frame during the part of the final battle when all the fighter planes are forming up, you can see a couple of Harriers, A-10s and F-16s in the mix, however that's the only time you ever see them and they're way in the background. They only budgeted for one extreme-detail fighter CG-model, which was the F/A-18. That's why there was such a fuckload of just those (more than than have ever existed at any point in history, even ''after'' the aliens shot down the entire first counterattack earlier in the movie) for the finale.
** The novelization is a little more realistic in this department. Eagle squadron (the one the President commands) is formed of F-15s found stored at a "satellite" base that's part of the {{Area 51}} complex. They are in a grave state of disrepair and several have to be cannibalized to make the others flightworthy, so that only about 8 fly in the actual battle. The rest of the force is formed from what ever they can find, including Russian fighters (acquired through various means during the UsefulNotes/ColdWar for study at Area 51, TruthInTelevision actually), and even UsefulNotes/WorldWarII fighters (a P-51 is mentioned). During the battle the planes are split into two groups: the shooters, modern American planes, and the decoys, Russian and other planes for which weapons and ammunition did not exist on base. The latter group was meant to go in first, [[HeroicSacrifice attract the attention of the alien fighters and draw them off]], allowing the former group to close in and open fire.
** During the film's climax, Eagle Twenty announces "Fox Two", which is NATO code for the launch of an infrared guided missile, but the missile shown is an AIM-120 AMRAAM, an active radar guided missile that would be launched with "Fox Three."
** The attack on the alien ship with [=AMRAAMs=] and Sidewinders in itself is another example, considering the sheer size of the target. Even the biggest air-to-air missiles in reality only have a 75-kilogram warhead - not much threat to a ship the size of a city. Air-to-ground weapons are closer to 500 kilos... or since the F/A-18 is cleared for the whole gamut of US Navy aircraft weapons, they could have led with something even ''[[NukeEm bigger]]''. Not that this would really have helped, since supposedly [[SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale the entire nuclear arsenal of the world could only vaporise less than 1% of the volume of one of the saucers]]. There's also the question of whether or not the missiles' guidance systems (programmed to look for airplanes) could actually recognize the damn thing as a target to be engaged rather than a mountain to be avoided.
** The original ending for the film sees Russell being denied a place in the final counter attack against the aliens. So he takes one of the Air Force's missiles, straps it to his biplane and sends it into the cannon. If this was to be attempted in reality, the plane would stall on its way up, making it the most awkward self sacrifice in history.
* ''[[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118261/ Asteroid]]'' movie. [[EnergyWeapon A laser]] (judging by its size, geodesic; and of course, with the ray visible in space) fastened onto an F-16, [[SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale manually aimed at a megameter or so]], which blows up the big asteroid. Made even worse by the comment in-film that the lasers ''had'' to be fired from within the atmosphere to be aimed properly, as though having all that air in the way made it ''easier'' to target something in space. Though one could argue that it would be silly even with the Pentagon's "realistic" solution — an experimental laser cannon on a Boeing 747, which at least could take out missiles or aircraft. As opposed to the plain and sane original idea: arrange meeting of damn stone and [[DeusExNukina little fusion device]], the higher orbit the better, then watch some StuffBlowingUp.
* Toward the end of the rescue in the 1986 movie ''Film/TheDeltaForce'', a Boeing 707 is shown practically bulletproof in that it takes fire from Kalashnikov rifles as it is taking off only to have the bullets [[BulletSparks apparently glance off its metal skin]]. In real life, such a plane's relatively thin aluminum skin would be perforated and the plane rendered unsafe or unable to fly. There's also the issue of supposedly USAF C-130s having Israeli Air Force numbers (since the C-130s were leased from the Israeli military for the film), but that issue is quite minor and easily overlooked compared to the [[ImmuneToBullets Bulletproof Boeing]].
* ''Film/Midway1976'':
** The film was made with essentially no special-effects budget. One effect of this is that flying scenes are done with whatever StockFootage they could get their hands on. It's common for airplanes to change model in mid-flight; the most JustForFun/{{egregious}} example is an airplane that makes its landing approach as a engine propeller-driven SBD Dauntless dive-bomber, but crashes onto the carrier's flight deck as a [=McDonnell=] Banshee jet fighter.
** Other aircraft that appear in the film but are completely out of place are [=F6F=] Hellcats frequently shown in place of the [=F4F=] Wildcats actually flown by the Navy and Marines during the time of the battle, FM-2s (a license-built, late-war variant of the Wildcat first appearing in 1944) for hangar and flight deck scenes, a different SBD Dauntless turns into a [=F4U=] Corsair in the middle of a bombing run, and a TBD Devastator (actually depicted by a [=SB2U=] Vindicator) turns into a TBM Avenger and in the next shot becomes another Hellcat. Almost all of the Japanese aircraft in the film were the same modified T-6 trainers used as WeaponsUnderstudies for ''Film/ToraToraTora'' a few years earlier. All the scenes of TBD Devastators and SBD Dauntlesses flying in formation are actually [=SB2U=] Vindicators.
* ''Film/Midway2019'':
** Very few of the [=B5N=] torpedo/level bombers used by the Japanese were armed, carrying only a flexible gun for defense. However they are shown joining the Zero fighters strafing the American fleet at Pearl Harbor.
** Two important aircraft from the battle are missing entirely:
*** The Japanese [=D3A=] "Val" dive bombers, which were used extensively at Pearl Harbor and Midway, including causing severe damage to ''Yorktown'' in the first wave of ''Hiryū'''s counterattack. They briefly appear for a few seconds during the Pearl Harbor attack scene (the fixed landing gear gives them away), but they never appear afterward.
*** More egregious is lack of the American [=F4F=] Wildcat fighters. As much as the devastating blow to the Japanese fleet, Midway was important as a turning point for the Navy's fighter pilots, as it was the first opportunity for Thach to use what would become the Thach Weave in a major combat with the Japanese.
** Doolittle's raiders are shown flying B-25Js. This later model was distinguished by the top turret having been moved forward directly behind the cockpit. The historical Raiders flew the earlier B-25B, which had the dorsal turret located much further aft.
** Dick Best's Dauntless is accurately painted with the number B1 and two diagonal white stripes on the vertical stabilizer, as shown in [[http://fineartofdecalsimages.s3.amazonaws.com/SBD-3B1LS.jpg this]] color plate. The other ''Enterprise'' [=SBDs=] and [=TBDs=] show a similar marking scheme (such as Scouting Six's Dauntlesses using an S# fuselage number). However this was only the aircraft's markings ''at the time of Midway'', but is used throughout the film. As shown [[http://www.clubhyper.com/reference/images/coralseasbd_1.jpg here]], from 1941 through May, 1942, US Navy aircraft featured red and white stripes on the rudder, and red disks in the middle of the roundel. The red was removed to reduce the chance of American gunners mistaking the red disk for the Japanese ''Hinomaru'', (aka, the "Meatball") and prevent friendly fire incidents. Additionally, ''Enterprise'''s air wing adopted comically oversized national insignia for the first few months of the war as a result of the loss of several aircraft and their crews to friendly fire when they arrived at Pearl Harbor in the aftermath of the attack. None of the aircraft in the film are shown with these early markings.
** Army B-26s from Midway attack the Japanese fleet in a level bombing attack. Midway ''did'' contribute B-26s to the battle, however they were armed with ''torpedoes'', not bombs. There was a level bombing attack against the Japanese as well,[[note]]two, in fact: the very first action of the day unsuccessfully attacked the transports carrying the invasion force, and a second against the carriers later in the day[[/note]] however this was carried out by B-17s ([[RuleOfThree also]] entirely absent from the film). Interestingly, the movie does feature a notable event involving a crashing B-26 which almost struck one of the Japanese carriers, with the captain of said carrier dismissing a sailor's question whether it was [[RammingAlwaysWorks intentional]] by saying "[the Americans] are not ''that'' brave," but doesn't mention the more infamous incident of the B-26, ''Suzie-Q'', which [[BuzzingTheDeck strafed the deck]] of the ''Akagi'', killing two men, and supposedly contributed to Nagumo ordering another attack on Midway instead of holding his planes in reserve for anti-ship operations as ordered.
* Despite [[BackedByThePentagon the support of the U.S. Military]], the 2007 ''Film/{{Transformers}}'' movie contains a number of errors. An AC-130U Spooky gunship is used to take down the Decepticon Scorponok using "105 sabot rounds". The AC-130 is armed with a 105 mm howitzer, but there is no such thing as a sabot round for this type of weapon.[[note]]The cockpit dialogue during this sequence is accurate, though, since it was an actual AC-130 crew - Creator/MichaelBay simply gave the crew the target details and rolled camera, with the only condition being that their target is a [[OutsideContextProblem tank-sized metal scorpion]].[[/note]] Later, F-22 Raptors were used to attack the Decepticons during the final battle using laser guided air-to-ground missiles. In real life, the F-22 cannot carry any laser guided missiles; it is designed to use GPS-guided glide bombs for air-to-ground attacks. Also, freaking jet powered Predator. While the C variant of the Predator is jet powered, it also has substantially redesigned wings and fuselage. Putting a jet engine in a Predator B frame and putting it through the maneuvers it goes through in the movie would probably have snapped the wings off. The first scene in the film also has an army spec-ops team return to base on V-22 Ospreys but the interior shots appear to be from a CH-47 Chinook. On a more minor note, a lot of the military procedures shown, especially during the AC-130U scene, are on a ''massively'' condensed time-scale (it would have taken an hour at ''least'' to get all the military assets depicted on station), but this is at least somewhat understandable since, if it took a realistic time scale, Scorponok likely would have finished off the entire squad and levelled the village before the first air asset even has visual.
* Going over every other example in each film would probably double the length of the page but one of the worst is in ''Film/TransformersTheLastKnight'': before [[spoiler:the TRF go to attack the Ignition Chamber and save the Earth,]] Lennox explains how crazy their plan is by stating that the Osprey has a flight ceiling of 12,000 feet but they would be launching them from "almost double that", requiring what is best described as a mass [[ComingInHot controlled crash-landing]] as the Ospreys ''apparently'' cannot generate enough lift at those altitudes. In reality the Osprey has a flight ceiling of 25,000 feet, perfectly capable of reaching the TRF's target. A better issue to bring would be that the Osprey would have trouble getting through the literal maze of [[spoiler:Cybertron chunks to the Ignition Chamber.]]
* ''Charlie Wilson's War'' used stock footage to depict Soviet fighters getting shot down. In several scenes, the fighters are obviously either F-16s or foreign variants, not Soviet planes.
* In ''Film/TheGreatWaldoPepper'', two relatively common Tiger Moth biplanes were wrecked in the crash scenes, standing in for the much rarer Standard J-1. Ironically, most sources about the film mistakenly identify the Standard J-1s actually used in the movie as the smaller (but more famous) Curtis JN-1 "Jenny". Tallmantz aviation, like most real Barnstormers, preferred the Standard because it was larger, stronger, and used a more reliable engine.
* In ''Film/AceVenturaWhenNatureCalls'', the opening sequence features Ace climbing some Alpine-looking mountains, dressed in suspenders and shorts often stereotypically portrayed on Swiss alpinists, and there is a helicopter flying around him painted in crimson red with a white cross at each side — the symbol and flag of Switzerland. The aircraft's tail number (license plate)? Canadian registration. [[CaliforniaDoubling Location shooting indeed.]]
* ''Film/ExecutiveDecision'' features what is apparently an F-117 stealth fighter that has somehow been modified to hold a sort of air-to-air docking collar while still having space for half a dozen armed commandos and the pilot, making the passenger compartment at least as large as the entire fuselage, leaving no space for engines, fuel tanks, or anything else. Apparently, the USAF has developed [[Series/DoctorWho TARDIS technology]].
* In ''Film/TrueLies'' the portrayal of the Harrier jet is highly erroneous. Harriers are not designed to hover as long as it did in the film, are not bulletproof, and would be unflyable if it got its instrument panel shot up like it did.
** Also, exactly how does Arnold avoid ''getting sucked into the intake & [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_object_damage FODing]] the damn engine''?
** If a man were to be snagged on the forward fins of one of its missiles, it would immediately be directed downward by the weight pulling on it. Said weight would also ensure that the missile wouldn't have anywhere near the power or maneuverability to bring itself back on course, and would most likely slam into the ground.
** Also, despite doing so in the film, the real world AV-8B cannot use any of its weapons, even the gun, when configured in any way for hovering.
* In ''Film/TheRock'', a flight of F/A-18 Hornets identified as from the Air Force are sent on a bombing mission when it appears that the heroes have failed to neutralize the threat. The Air Force does not use F/A-18s in real life; only the Navy and the Marine Corps do. This was strange considering that the rest of the movie focused on the Marines and Navy.
** Interestingly, the closeups of the F/A-18s display the squadron logo of VMFA-314, a Marine Corps squadron,[[note]]in fact the "Black Knights", the same squadron mentioned in ''Film/IndependenceDay''[[/note]] yet also have "U.S. Air Force" painted prominently on their sides.
* Averted in, of all things, ''Film/DrStrangelove'': not only was the B-52 correct in exterior shots (save for casting the shadow of a B-17[[note]]the shadow of the camera plane[[/note]]), the B-52's cockpit avionics, especially the arming console, were so accurate that the Air Force freaked out (the bomber's interior was still classified). As it happened, [[Creator/StanleyKubrick Kubrick]] and his crew were familiar with B-17s and B-29s [[DuringTheWar from the War]] and had simply done an amazing job of extrapolation.
* ''The Concorde: Airport '79'' (also known as ''Airport 80'' because it wasn't released until 1980 in some countries) was full of such howlers:
** When the Concorde is being chased by heat-seeking missiles, George Kennedy ''opens a window'' in the cockpit, then leans out into the onrushing ''supersonic'' air and fires a flare gun. The force should have ripped the window housing open, and torn Kennedy's arm off.
** In the course of dodging the heat-seeking missiles, the Concorde's engines flame out. The plane immediately nosedives ''straight down'', plummeting like a rock. In the real world, when an airliner (even a supersonic one) loses power, it becomes a glider. It won't have the best glide performance in the world, but it's still going to be ''gliding'', not falling (this was how [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli_Glider Air Canada Flight 143]] managed to make it to the decommissioned RCAF Station Gimli runway while out of fuel).
** It also lines up with the runway a few kilometers short of threshold, and only then does anyone (including airport tower) notice there's a multicoloured hot air balloon over the runway. Or the F-4 Phantom pilot somehow failing to shoot down an ''airliner'' with either missiles or guns for four entire minutes. Or a civilian runway equipped with barricade webbing large enough for an entire airliner. Or continuing the flight a few hours after two independent attempts to shoot down the plane (one a supposed accident, but the other involving a fucking ''fighter plane'' going after it) plus making an emergency landing and barely averting a runway overrun. Or the magic door-opening machine that punches in an access code by making the keypad ''push itself''. Or that the same device also somehow operates the Concorde's fuel jettison pumps from the cargo bay.
** There's also the CallARabbitASmeerp of the "Buzzard Attack Drone." We generally call a target-seeking UCAV which carries a single warhead a ''missile'', guys (unless we're playing ''TabletopGame/StarFleetBattles'').
* Averted in ''Film/CatchTwentyTwo'': The legendary Hollywood stunt pilot Frank Tallman put together an entire squadron of 24 B-25 bombers for the film. Even the camera plane was a B-25 with a special optical glass nose. It's been said that part of the reason so many B-25s are still flying today and not scrapped is because they were made flyable for this movie. The one that burned in the "crash" scene was a barely-flyable hulk; they flew it to the filming location wheels down.
* ''Film/{{Stealth}}''
** The F/A-37s would never be able to take off from a carrier. Aside from being based on a somewhat dubious concept aircraft which would likely have trouble transitioning between wing angles, there's the minor issue that they're apparently all but VTOL-capable, swing-wing CATOBAR aircraft with comically gigantic missile loadouts and utterly insane range; there's no way an aircraft with such a laundry list of capabilities would be able to take off from a standard ''Nimitz'' catapult, and it's doubtful if it could do so at all, especially not with the stated empty weight of nine metric tons for a 70-foot aircraft. And even if all that weren't true, there's the small matter of their rear landing gear being secured to the carrier's deck with tie-down chains when they're on the catapult. Although it's worth mentioning Northrop-Grumann believed the aerodynamic concept might be feasible and as such has taken steps to ensure they had complete control over the forward swept swing wing design for the next two decades by [[http://www.google.com/patents?id=iRQXAAAAEBAJ&printsec=abstract&zoom=4&source=gbs_overview_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false patenting it]] in 2000.
** There's also the infamous exploding plane scene, where Jessica Biel punches out seconds before her plane explodes. Next, the pilotless-but-still-in-one-piece plane twists around and starts ''barreling after her'' like she insulted its mother (although it ''had'' been twisting around before she hit the eject). '''Then''' it explodes, and an enormous cloud of wreckage chases her down. The "LudicrousGibs" level of debris rather suggests she was carrying a Lockheed C-130 troop transport in her missile bay.
** Slightly less obvious but equally hilarious is how the F/A-37s are shown to outfly Su-37s using exactly the kind of cool supermaneuver [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ALt3m3Kkhw those very Su-37s introduced in real life]]. Somehow, the Russian pilots only know how to fly in straight lines.
** Made even worse when you know that those very same maneuvers are reserved for airshows and technology demonstration, and that no competent pilot would actually be stupid enough to attempt one in an actual dogfight. Made even more worse (worser?) that they are in a dogfight at all, when both sides are equipped with Beyond Visual Range missile technology, which means dogfighting is your last resort, not your go-to strategy for an engagement.[[note]]Which is pretty much case-in-point as to why the United States isn't (as) interested in super-manuverability outside of their F-22 Raptors; sure, it makes for a good airshow, but most of their modern jet fighters are little more than advanced platforms for their missiles, which are typically what does all the maneuvering. As fun as 3D-thrust vectoring can be, the USAF just sees it as [[AwesomeButImpractical a lot of extra parts that have a low probability of actually being used to their fullest extent]] during the aircraft's service life.[[/note]] Or the fact the non-stealth Faux-37s weren't even detected until they were only 25 miles out, etc. There's also the fact that these Su-37s are shown as two-seaters, when the only two Su-37s in the real world only have room for the pilot.
** The F/A-37's cockpit has more elbow room than do passengers on commercial jets. A bit more forgivably, the joystick is in a between-the-legs placement; most American jets since the F-16 have a side stick.
* ''Film/MegaSharkVsGiantOctopus'' actually has a shapeshifting fighter jet due to the poor use of stock footage. In one shot the jet is an F-15, in another shot it is an F/A-18, and in yet another shot the same jet is an F-22.
* The problem of acquiring Soviet bloc aircraft prior to the end of the Cold War is also encountered with helicopters. ''Ersatz'' Soviet helicopters include:
** ''Film/AViewToAKill'': the Soviet helicopter that chases Bond in the pre-title sequence is a (West) German MBB-105.
** ''Film/RamboFirstBloodPartII'' and ''Film/RamboIII'': the Soviet helicopter is a French Aérospatiale SA 330 Puma, fitted with cosmetic modifications (most obviously the stub wings with rocket pods) to a decent semblance of a Mil Mi-24 "Hind A." The fake front fuselage apparently made it stunningly hard to actually fly. This ended up being carried over to all of the video games, licensed or fan-made.
*** SA 330s stood in for Hind-As in ''Film/{{Red Dawn|1984}}'', as well, though they actually got close to early model Hinds at least in the forward fuselage. Check out the early model [[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7c/Mil_Mi-24A_Hind.jpg Hind]] vs the [[http://www.imfdb.org/w/images/b/b1/RedDawnFakeHind06a.jpg fake Hind]] from ''Red Dawn''.
** ''Film/TheBeastOfWar'': a French-built, Israeli-operated Aérospatiale ''Super Frélon'' stands in for the Soviet Mi-8 "Hip".
** It didn't stop after the dissolution of the USSR, either. In ''Film/{{Godzilla 1998}}'', the "Russian" twin-rotor helicopter that picks up Nick Tatapoulos (Matthew Broderick) from Chernobyl is an American Piasecki H-21 "Workhorse". It is dated to the 1950s, and it was one of only two flyable ones left in the world. Today, there are exactly four- all in museums. And no, no Russian bird, not even a twin-rotor, ever looked very much like the H-21, often nicknamed the "Flying Banana".
* ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'':
** Rare aversion: Elasti-girl's radio dialogue when the missiles are closing in on her plane is actually accurate, since her use of "Buddy Spike" makes sense in context since she believes the island to be friendly and the term is used to warn the "spiker" that the radar lock was from a friendly and can be disregarded. The only goof is that it was a ground radar, and the proper term for a ground radar threat indication is "Mud" followed by a clock direction.
** Also, the tail number -- [[WesternAnimation/TheIronGiant IG99]] -- is invalid for an American-registered aircraft.
* A less egregious but more obvious example is from ''Beyond the Time Barrier'', where the F-102 changes side numbers between takeoff & landing. (The effects of jumping ahead in time?)
* ''Film/TheATeam''
** In TheTeaser, Murdock flies a helicopter as if it were a plane, notably [[ImprobablePilotingSkills performing a barrel roll with apparent ease]]--which the Huey ''[[RealityIsUnrealistic really can]]'' do, there's just no sane reason why you'd ever want to--[[ArtisticLicensePhysics angling the nose of the helicopter upward to "pull up"]] and stalling to the point of tumbling out of the air, but managing to recover. Which is precisely to point out how insanely badass he is. The best part is, in order to evade a heat-seeking missile, Murdock switches off the engine of the helicopter for a moment — the fact that there would ''still'' be a significant heat signature notwithstanding.
** The fight scene with the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Atomics_MQ-9_Reaper Reaper drones]] is utter nonsense. A Reaper couldn't intercept the A-Team's plane to begin with: the normal cruising speed of a C-130 is 336 mph (540 km/h) but the Reaper tops out at about 300 mph (482 km/h). Also, they aren't armed with machine guns, only missiles (and air-to-ground missiles at that), nor are they capable of the dogfighting-level maneuverability seen in the tank scene. They're designed for long loiter time in low-velocity flight, and are known to lose their connection to the satellite if they bank too hard to right or left.
* ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheLastCrusade'' — the German Fighters shown in the film are not period planes but Swiss-made Pilatus P-2 aircraft built after World War II.
** Probably an example of using what's available. The Pilatus P-2 looks a lot like the Arado 96, the standard Luftwaffe advanced trainer of the war years (probably because after the war, several of Arado's designers went to Switzerland and were hired by... you guessed it, Pilatus). And quite a few Ar-96s had bomb racks and twin synchronized 7.9mm machine guns in the cowling, as shown in the film, for armaments training. The use of a pair of armed trainers for the mission (shooting up the Jones boys) may just have been a case of a training unit being the closest available air asset when the orders came down the chain of command.
** A more glaring issue is the crash of one of the planes; it attempts to follow Indy and his father into a tunnel, but unfortunately the tunnel is just slightly too narrow for the plane, resulting in its wings getting sheared off. Then, through some [[ArtisticLicensePhysics miraculous act of momentum]], the plane, sliding on its belly, actually manages to ''overtake'' the car it is chasing and exit through the other side of the tunnel before conveniently exploding. Apparently it was customary back then to coat the roadway within tunnels with vaseline.
* Averted in ''Film/WhereEaglesDare'' - In the climax, when Smith's team is escaping from Oberhausen airfield in the Ju-52, the trainers shown in Luftwaffe markings are North American T-6 Texans. The Luftwaffe did in fact have such trainers, captured from the Belgian Air Force in the 1940 blitzkrieg of the Low Countries and France. Likewise with the T-6 Texans seen at the airfield in ''Film/TheGreatEscape''.
** ''Where Eagles Dare'' still slips up by using a Bell Model 47-- an American helicopter that ''hadn't even been built'' when the movie takes place-- to represent a German helicopter, possibly meant to be a Flettner Fl-282.
* In ''Film/SupermanReturns'', Lex Luthor is stranded on an island with an out-of-fuel helicopter, and wishes he had just a ''quart'' of gasoline. The helicopter in question, however, was an [=AW109=], which has twin turboshaft engines. Turboshafts are to helicopters what turboprops are to airplanes, and like the latter, they run on Jet-A (kerosene), not avgas (gasoline).
** Besides, a single quart of fuel would barely be enough to warm the engines up to proper operating temperatures, much less take off and fly for any appreciable distance.
* In ''Interceptor Force 2'', the Russian fighters are called [=MiG=]-29s. They're really [=MiG=]-25s.
* ''Interceptor'' (1993). There are supersonic, highly-agile F-117s that launch Sidewinder missiles out of the nose gear wheel well and have folding wings, which can deploy in flight after falling out of the back of a C-5. Also, the engines can somehow start by themselves without pneumatics, AND somehow not have a compressor stall during the aforementioned free fall. Then there's the KC-10 that the bad guys use to board the C-5 in flight, by sliding down the inside of the refueling boom and cutting through the fuselage above the crew rest compartment. Then there's the C-5, where 90% of the movie takes place. Apparently they were allowed to film the scenes on a real C-5, but no C-5 has all the air ducts and crawlspaces that this one has. The terrorists also siphon fuel from the 5 to the 117s from inside the cargo bay, in flight. And at the climax, it is [[EveryCarisaPinto blown up]] with a Sidewinder. Empty fuel tanks notwithstanding, a C-5 has taken a missile hit on takeoff in real life, and only lost the engine the missile was locked on to. [[RealityisUnrealistic It circled around and landed safely.]]
* In ''Film/TheDayTheEarthStoodStill2008'', the "sphere" and robot sitting in Central Park are attacked by Predator [=UCAVs=], armed with Sidewinder air-to-air missiles and Hellfire anti-armor missiles, said [=UCAVs=] being flown by U.S. Army operators. First of all, the Army doesn't fly Predators[[note]]The US Army actually flies the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Atomics_MQ-1C_Gray_Eagle MQ-1C]] variant, called the Grey Eagle or Sky Warrior, which has minor physical differences[[/note]], they belong to the U.S. Air Force (and the CIA, but we don't talk about that). Second, when the order to launch is given, the operators fire the Sidewinders, which are infra-red homing air-to-air missiles with relatively small annular blast-fragmentation warheads intended to shred fighter aircraft like a duck hit by birdshot. Not only are such light warheads useless against what is pretty obviously a pair of heavily-armored targets, they aren't generating enough heat to let the missiles' infra-red guidance systems lock on to them to begin with. In such a situation, the Sidewinder will "go dumb", and probably miss, and even if it hits, it won't accomplish much. And since the operators were supposed to be from the Army, you'd think they'd know enough to use the Hellfires, which are ''intended'' for use on heavily-armored ground targets (like tanks, for instance) when shooting at the equivalent of a small warship.
* In the film version of ''Film/TheHuntForRedOctober'', the crash of an F-14 Tomcat is depicted using StockFootage of an [=F9F=] Panther from the UsefulNotes/KoreanWar. The crash being presented through a low-resolution CRT monitor and the footage focusing on the aircraft's burning nose section tumbling across the deck somewhat helps obfuscate this, but if you pay attention during the first second or so it becomes obvious.
* In ''Film/RedTails'', the all-black 332d Pursuit Group is depicted as upgrading from their older Curtiss P-40 Warhawks to shiny new North American P-51D Mustangs. In RealLife, they transitioned first to the Bell P-39 Airacobra (for all of a month or so), then to the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt, and ''then'' to the North American P-51''C'' Mustang. The most identifiable difference between the C and D models of the Mustang is that the C has a conventional "razorback" canopy more reminiscent of the P-40 Warhawk, while the D has the bubble canopy that the fighters are most often depicted with.
** Though they did a much better job of it than HBO's ''Film/TheTuskegeeAirmen'', which depicts them flying Mustangs from the very start.
** ''Red Tails'' also provides the curious insight that you can open a B-17's bomb bay doors by setting the fuel mix for the number 3 engine to the idle cutoff position. The real bomb bay door control is not in the cockpit or particularly dramatic looking.
** The [=Me-262s=] like the one flown by Pretty Boy during the final battle were armed with four [=30mm=] cannon, firing explosive shells. [[spoiler: If Lightning had been hit by even ''one'' of those rounds in RealLife he would have been turned into a [[LudicrousGibs red smear all over his cockpit]], much less the dozen or so that fatally wounded him in the movie]].
* In ''Sudden Death'', the villain's [=JetRanger=] tilts back and goes vertically down into the stadium with its tail straight down and nose up in one of the silliest-looking copter crashes ever filmed. This is impossible with the rotors still spinning. Since they provide lift, upon going nose-up the [=JetRanger=] should've just spun out of control backwards due to the force of the rotor wash now pushing horizontally instead of vertically. In addition, the rate of descent is slow - a full 58 seconds from when it first starts descending to when its tail first hits the ice.
* In the Japanese film ''Storm Over The Pacific'', the Zeroes are painted green. This did not happen until 1944, 3 years after Pearl Harbor.
* In any number of low budget films where aviation is not of the essence, mistakes are rampant:
** In ''Film/StreetOfAThousandDreams'', a man takes a flight from the US to Baghdad. The plane which takes off is a three rear-engine 727, while the plane that lands is a four winged-engine 707. From there, he's taken to the local Baghdad airport to take a small plane to Basrah. All of the planes there have N numbers, which is the designation applied to US planes.
** ''Film/CoffeeTeaOrMe'', the stewardesses take off in a 727 and land in a 707 (seems to be a pattern here).
* The CGI flying sequences were were spot on, but the scriptwriters for ''Film/TheAviator'' just used random aviation terms in any dialogue between Howard Hughes and Odie. Interwar-era biplanes did not produce reverse thrust, for example.
* In ''Film/BattlefieldEarth'', the heroes find a hangar full of Harriers, all of which aren't used for a '''millennium'''. Nothing should be working after about a millennium, it takes years and not weeks to learn to fly a plane (much less a VTOL-capable plane like the Harrier, which got trainees killed at a rather regular pace), none of them have flight-suits and yet they're all stunt dogfighter material. On the positive side, they ''do'' mention that Harrier jets can hover. Note that Harriers are so unreliable that the fact that they can even be repaired is implausible.
* In the low-budget film ''American Warship'', CGI of a South Korean fighter desperately evading attack switches repeatedly between being an F-15 and an F-16. Also shown is stock footage of a C-130 Hercules dropping bombs... from a ventral bay. The C-130, is of course a cargo plane and, aside from literally shoving the near-car sized BLU-82 "daisy cutter" directly out the back of its cargo bay, can't drop bombs at all.
* In the film ''Literature/TheGunsOfNavarone'':
** The good guys get strafed at one point by a German fighter plane. The actual plane was an [=F4U=] Corsair, which was an American fighter plane mainly used by the Marines in the Pacific.
** At least in the close-up shots, the aircraft are models of Ju-87 Stukas, precisely the type of dive-bomber that would have been used at the time. The recce plane that spots the heroes earlier on, however, is definitely American rather than German, since the production had the help of the Greek army and navy -- who happened to have a lot of surplus American hardware on hand.
* In ''Film/PacificRim'', the F-22 Raptors are shown firing two guns, but the production craft only has one (on the right side). At least the tracer rounds are coming from the right spot. More egregiously, there's no sane reason for an F-22 to ever get close enough to a ground target that it crashes into it: even if we assume it had expended whatever missiles or bombs it had started with, the M61 Vulcan cannon it carries has an effective range of half a mile.
* Averted in Canadian film ''Arrow'' which used a very accurate fiberglass replica of the real CF-105 interceptor built by an enthusiast. A rumor at the time claimed that, when the completed prototypes were being destroyed in the movie-- which is why no real Arrow survives today--the film crew actually cut up the replica they were using to pieces, to the dismay of the guy who built (and still owned) it. In reality the replica just hasn't been publicly displayed in years.
* Averted and played straight in the 1938 film ''Test Pilot''. One of the planes used was a [=Y1B-17=] that crashes in the movie and the studio got permission from the United States Army to use one for some, but not all, of the scenes. They had to use a modified [=DC-2=] as a stand in at times because the Army was quite understandably skittish about letting a movie studio have free reign with a very expensive heavy bomber prototype that was still under evaluation. The first production B-17 wouldn't make its maiden flight until over a year after the film was released.
* ''Film/FullMetalJacket'' is a minor offender - the helicopter which transports Joker and Rafter Man to Hue is British built Westland Wessex - a licensed variant of the Sikorsky HUS-1/UH-34 used by the [[SemperFi USMC]] in UsefulNotes/TheVietnamWar, but powered by turboshaft engines and thus with minor yet visible visual differences.
* A downplayed example in ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast''. While the Gulfstream II, the plane the X-Men use to fly to Paris, was first manufactured in the 1960s, the winglets[[note]]the vertical surfaces on the tips of the wings[[/note]] seen on this particular example were not part of the original design and were first available as an aftermarket retrofit in the 1990s (though much like the [[CoolPlane Blackbird]][[note]]the SR-71 was still in development at the time of ''First Class'' was set, and neither it nor the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_A-12 Lockheed A-12]] from which it was derived were VTOL-capable as the X-Men's jet is[[/note]] this is justifiable by Xavier's immense personal fortune and Hank's engineering know-how allowing for a custom, one-off modification). Also, the plane's tail number of [=N540EA=] reveals that it was manufactured in 1975, two years after the setting of the film.
* Creator/PedroAlmodovar's ''I'm So Excited!'' (''Los amantes pasajeros'') has got almost everything avation-related glaringly wrong.
** The aircraft where the main part of the film takes place is in peril because one of the landing gear won't retract; the cause is given to be a wheel blocker left accidentally in place by the ground crew. Such thing would cause serious problems during taxiing and/or takeoff roll and would be instantly noticed by the pilots.
** When the landing gear indicator is shown in close-up, there are three green lights and one red. This indicates the exactly opposite situation as the one we're told about, as green light indicates the gear is down and locked and red light means it is completely retracted.
** The pilots state that they can't land because no airport would accept them. There's absolutely no explanation as to why no airport wants to allow an emergency landing, which is an obvious violation of regulations. [[note]]It would be somewhat understandable in case of a biological problem onboard - say, an outbreak of a rabid contagious disease - but not when there's a purely mechanical problem.[[/note]] Furthermore, even if the Spanish airports are unavailable for some convoluted reason, with the amount of fuel they have onboard - the flight was from Madrid to Mexico City - there are literally dozens of alternative airports capable of dealing with an [=A340=] in peril within their range - Rome-Fiumicino, Milan-Linate, Lisbon-Portela, Paris-CDG/Orly/Le Bourget, Frankfurt, London-Heathrow, Zurich-Kloten, Vienna, Prague, Warsaw-Chopin are just some examples.
* ''Film/TheGreatRaid'': In order to provide a distraction so the Rangers can get into position to attack the prison, the USAAF sends an aircraft in to buzz the camp and hold the attention of the Japanese garrison. TruthInTelevision. However the aircraft is portrayed by a Lockheed Hudson bomber, a light bomber/attack plane primarily used by the RAF. The Hudson was a relatively conventional-looking twin-engined aircraft. The plane chosen to assist the actual Cabanatuan raid was a North American P-61 Black Widow, a heavily-armed, radar-equipped night fighter with a much more unusual twin-boom fuselage not unlike the P-38 Lightning.
* ''Film/ThreeIdiots'': The Airbus A321 in the opening scene has a ''different registration number'' on either side of its fuselage. Then, in a view from right under the aircraft, when the landing gear come out, each bogie has two axles, while shots from a distance (correctly) show one axle for each bogie.
* In ''Film/ConAir'': The plane that transports federal prisoners is depicted as as a flying prison, with cells for disruptive inmates. The real planes involved in the "Con Air" transport system are little different from regular commercial planes, and there are no cells. Inmates are shackled during flight, but safety regulations prohibited shackling them to any part of the plane.
* Mostly averted in ''Film/BattleOfBritain''. British aircraft were portrayed by actual Spitfires and Hurricanes, though typically variants that entered service later in the war. On the German side, the Bf-109s and He-111s were played by HA-1112s and CASA 2.111s, respectively - Spanish-built copies whose most noteworthy difference from the original designs is that they were both powered by the same Rolls Royce Merlin engines as the British planes!
* In ''Film/HomeAlone1'', the [=McCallisters=] take a morning flight from Chicago to Paris. While airlines do have direct flights between the two cities, flights from the United States to Europe take off in the evening in order to take advantage of the time zone difference.
* In ''Film/TheBourneLegacy'', Aaron Cross and Marta Shearing take an American Airlines flight from New York to Manila. Not only does American not fly to Manila, there are no direct flights from New York to Manila. This flight also uses a Boeing 747, a type that does not form part of American's fleet (also, external shots of the plane are of a 747, whilst the internal ones are of a 777).
* In the Creator/StevenSeagal movie ''Flight of Fury'', they used so much stock footage that the type of aircraft varied between almost every scene, as well as having the stock footage of the SR-71 and the F-117 be fuzzy because it was not filmed in high-def, and changing from day to night and back again in a few minutes of flight time. But the worst parts were the aircraft TravelingAtTheSpeedOfPlot, with the only consistency being that higher real-world top speeds somehow translated to ''longer'' trips in the plot:
** A C-130 (max speed 410 MPH or 675 km/h) travels from Bakersfield, California to northern Afghanistan carrying [=SEALs=], and does so in 3 hours (noted by the timestamps of the various shots) without re-fueling.
** An F-117 (max speed 617 MPH or 1,003 km/h) makes the same trip in less than 6 hours, again without re-fueling.
** An SR-71 (max speed classified, but listed as 2,193 MPH or 3,540 km/h) makes the same trip in ''48'' hours, but requires re-fueling.
** All of them fly west over the Pacific and China, which would have added a few thousand miles to the trip over taking the polar route (a distance of 13,000 miles or 21,000 kilometers).
* ''Film/TearsOfTheSun'''s finale has some pretty terrible issues with the F/A-18s that show up for the GunshipRescue at the end. The jets switch between clean (no ordinance) to carrying [=HARM=]s (''anti-radar missiles'' - against infantry, no less), then back to clean. And then when they do fire, they shoot missiles...that turn into cluster bombs...that are napalm. There are cluster missiles, but not for aircraft, and cluster napalm hasn't been a thing since [=WW2=] incendiary bombs. Oh, and the rescue helicopters show up moments after the jets, despite the jets being several times faster.
* ''Film/WonderWoman1984'' has a Panavia Tornado that the lead characters commandeer and apply magic to in order to create Wonder Woman's iconic invisible jet. However, it's shown to have side by side seating, whereas in real life, the Tornado has tandem seating with the co-pilot behind the pilot. A Tornado also has nowhere near the range to make a flight from Washington, DC to Egypt, much less make the same trip in reverse, without having to refuel in mid-air.
* ''Film/JurassicWorld'': A minor one, but Dane County Airport is a ''regional'' airport. They don't offer flights to Costa Rica from there, although you can get a flight to an international airport where you can get on a flight to Costa Rica. Or you could just drive to Chicago and save the cost of the first flight.
** Kayla Watts, a major supporting character in ''Film/JurassicWorldDominion'', is a pilot of a C-119 Flying Boxcar cargo plane. In real life, the last airworthy C-119s were scrapped or donated to museums starting in the late 1990s, with the very last one being retired in 2004. The movie, however, is set in 2022. Also, C-119s-- especially civilian ones-- were never equipped with ejection seats the way Kayla's is.
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[[quoteright:350:[[Film/AirplaneMode https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/airplane_mode_dab.png]]]]

[[quoteright:350:[[Film/{{Airport}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Airport79_01_350_6292.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:350:Concorde, Su-27, what the hell's the difference?]]

** The 2012 Christmas episode opened with a fake commercial making fun of Northwest Airlines, [[AnimationLeadTime 4 years after Northwest ceased to exist after merging with Delta]].