Continuity mistake: When Rafe's plane takes off from the carrier (as the second), you see the totally empty deck of the ship, even though there ought to be 14 planes left.
Revealing mistake: Other users have commented on the placement of the island on the Japanese carriers. If you watch the launch scene very carefully (as one squadron of planes flies over another of the carriers), the carrier is a modern, angled deck carrier, but the planes are all lined up backwards. As the shot moves over the ship, you can plainly see the bow of the carrier (with the protrusions for the catapult water brakes, and Japanese planes lined up on the bow, facing the stern). As the shot progresses down the ship, you will see the angled deck amidships, with the island where it belongs, and the planes taking off over the stern.
Revealing mistake: When the dead nurse's body (Betty I think her name is) is being placed on the pile of dead people, she blinks and twitches her face as the person carrying her puts her down.
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Roosevelt is delivering the "Day of Infamy" speech to Congress watch the microphone placement. The MBC microphone likes to move around from left to right.
Factual error: As with the film Tora! Tora! Tora!, in Pearl Harbor we see that two American fighter planes took off to fight the Japanese. In reality, a total of six American flights actually took off to repel the invaders.
Other mistake: Rafe is afraid of getting his wings removed because he has dyslexia (that his teachers couldn't make sense of) and that he has had "some schooling." To be a Lieutenant as Rafe is in the movie he would need a bachelor's degree. Also this mixing up letters didn't appear on all the letters he wrote to Evelyn. Or hindered his ability to read Evelyn's letters.
Suggested correction: For his education he got help from Danny and during his time in England he could have gotten help from any of the pilots, both to write and read. He is smart enough the get a bachelor's.
What utter nonsense. Rafe is so severely dyslexic that he cannot read a basic eye chart. No amount of "help" would get him through flight training school or university.
Factual error: Early in the film, a close-up of Rafe in his Army Air Corps uniform shows his wings. The wings are not Army Air Corps, but the "shield and stripes" of the US Air Force, which did not exist at that time. Additionally, when a priest is giving last rites to the dying, he says, "In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit." But before the Second Vatican Council, it was "Holy Ghost."
Factual error: In the shot where they show the pictures the Japanese spies took, you can see the helicopter pads on the ships. Also, during the attack, helicopter pads are visible on some ships. The helicopter was not used until the Korean War, and they didn't have helicopter pads on ships until more recently.
Factual error: While the hospital did sustain some damage during the actual battle at Pearl Harbor, the Japanese forces did not deliberately target or fire upon it. Hospitals are usually avoided in battles as the people within are not in any condition to fight back and it would just be consuming ammunition that would be needed for attacking more practical targets such as enemy aircraft, assault vehicles, weapon repositories, and such.
Factual error: The USS Hornet, a Yorktown-class aircraft carrier launched in 1940, is played by a much more modern Kitty Hawk-class carrier. The B-25s also take off from a steel deck instead of a historically accurate wooden deck.
Factual error: In the scene where the Japanese aircraft are launching for the attack on Pearl, an officer on one of the carriers holds a white flag in his right hand just as the planes are about to take off. Look carefully; the wind is blowing from the stern of the ship towards the bow (as evidenced by the position of the aircraft in the background). The flag should be moving in the opposite direction, as the carrier would be turned into the wind and moving forward at top speed to launch aircraft.
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Goose is in the bunker with everyone else, he says "Planes. Should we fire?" When he says this, we see him staring down the site of a 50 cal. In the next shot, we see the gun, but no Goose. And we know it's the same gun, because Red was by it both shots. Yet when we see the gun in the very next shot he is holding it again. He had no time to move away and back to the weapon again.
Visible crew/equipment: During the scene where Danny and Rafe are being chased at low level by several Zero fighters, there is one camera shot where we can see past a P-40's tail at the Japanese attackers. The nearest Zero appears to have a strange object attached to the top of its fuselage, just in front of the tail. Presumably, this object is a remote-controlled camera which was used by the film-makers for the aerial combat scenes.
Continuity mistake: In the scene where the Red head boy is proposing to the nurse, 2 men walk by together, one wearing a light coloured shirt with some scattered pattern on it, and the other wearing a plain white shirt. Then they walk by again a few seconds later.
Visible crew/equipment: Ben Affleck's character takes his fiance to the beach in his car. When they are both standing in front of the vehicle, the film crew can be seen in the reflection in the car's bumper.
Continuity mistake: During the attack on Pearl Harbor, Rafe, along with a couple of other pilots jump into a convertible car to drive to another airfield. The actual set they depart from (which is exploding all around them) is the same one they "arrive" at minutes later, but the whole set is intact, instead of an actual different set/location.
Plot hole: Danny receives the telegram from Rafe, telling him that he is alive, at the same time Rafe meets with Evelyn. The telegram must have been sent from Hawaii. Why didn't he just call on the phone? When Rafe reached the U.S. after leaving England why didn't he send a telegram then. In those days it took some time to travel from the Eastern U.S. all the way to Hawaii and there is no way he beat the telegram if it was sent when he returned to the U.S.
Continuity mistake: When Rafe is just about to burn Evelyn's letters, he folds them. In the first shot, he folds them with the writing on the inside, but in the next shot and the shot when the letters burn, the writing is on the outside.
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Danny, Rafe and Jimmy Doolittle are on the deck of the Hornet talking about "returning" the friendship medals before the attack on Tokyo, you can see what appears to be a radar dish covered with a grey tarpaulin. The scene cuts back to Doolittle, Danny and Rafe talking some more, and then back to a wide shot of Doolittle walking away. The mysterious tarped object is completely gone now.
Continuity mistake: When Rafe and Evelyn go to the Queen Mary ship and they are rising on the platform, and kissing, one sweeping camera shot shows the handle of the elevator controls going straight up. This would mean that they had stopped, yet they are still moving up. A couple of seconds later, a close up of the handle shows that it is now in the position to move the elevator up.
