Factual error: The color guard at the end during the Captain's memorial has their flags in the wrong order. The American flag is always on the left as you face the color guard.
Continuity mistake: During the show, after Bad Billy asks who's the highest ranking officer he lowers the mike. A shot later it's raised. A second later he repeats the question and the mike switches hands between shots.
Visible crew/equipment: Jordan arrives at the ship and Billy tells her "you can do this gig with your eyes closed." The whole crew is reflected on his sunglasses.
Continuity mistake: Right when Bad Billy introduces himself during the show his mike switches hands between shots.
Continuity mistake: Before Admiral Bates first speaks to Strannix, there is a dark-haired marine in a green uniform on his left. When Bates raises his hand to signal activating the audio to speak, Captain Garza (black uniform and silver hair) is suddenly on his left. Then it changes to another camera angle and the marine is back next to Bates. (00:36:40)
Continuity mistake: When the helicopter lands we see it is sitting over the white circle of the landing zone on the back of the ship. Later, right after the F18 is shot down, we see an aerial view of the ship with a small part of the back cut off, but part of the landing zone circle is visible and there is no helicopter. (00:13:30 - 00:36:00)
Continuity mistake: When Segal is creating the distraction in the kitchen with the microwave, he pours liquid on the sponge. In the next shot the sponge is deeper into the cup. When he puts it in the microwave it jumps back out of the cup.
Continuity mistake: During the fight between Ryback and Strannix, Strannix cuts Ryback above his left eyebrow with his knife. The cut disappears shortly afterwards, but reappears in a later shot.
Deliberate mistake: When the terrorists attack the ship the shot then goes to an external view of a Marine getting shot. The Marine falls but you can actually see him jump. (01:23:55)
Other mistake: When Commander Krill gains access to the captain's safe to retrieve the disc, the safe has no locks. (00:24:20)
Revealing mistake: When Ryback busts out his fellow mates and hands out weapons to them, the Uzi given to one of his mates does not have a magazine in it. (01:02:20)
Continuity mistake: In the captain's cabin just before Commander Krill shoots the captain, the cigar is in his left hand as he pulls the wag off the pistol, but when the shot changes to a closeup of Krill shooting, the cigar is in his mouth with no time to get there. (00:21:25)
Factual error: In the last scene, where Chief Ryback is at his captain's funeral, he's in his dress blues, and you can see his rating insignia to see that it is not of a cook (Mess Specialist/MS, now known as "Culinary Specialist/CS"), but that of a Yeoman. While in general, this still matches up with the history of the character (where Krill mentions that he could only be a cook or a yeoman after losing his security clearance for punching out his OIC), he wouldn't be cooking, he'd be doing office work. (01:38:42)
Audio problem: The two mercenaries Ryback kills in the kitchen have suppressors on their weapons yet you hear every shot as if the suppressors aren't attached.
Continuity mistake: Early in the film, a missile is fired from the ship, and it hits the satellite installation right outside the Navy headquarters (the people in the control room hear the explosion). It gets there very fast. Later in the film, a nuclear missile is sent towards Honolulu. That is supposed to take 24 minutes. Why so long, when the other missile got there much faster?
Suggested correction: The satellite facility wasn't at Pearl Harbor, it was somewhere else. Based on the map it was located on a small island and the ship was very close to it at the time the missile was fired so took very little time to get there. The people in the command center, not control room, hear the feed go out, not the explosion. Many hours later, and after a lot of sailing, when the missiles are fired at Honolulu, the ship could have been a couple hundred miles away from Oahu so the flight time at about 550 mph would be 24 minutes.
Factual error: In the scene where Ryback is swimming next to the submarine, it is clear that the water is brown and murky. If the ship is in the middle of the Pacific, the water would be crystal clear.
Suggested correction: While Mobile Bay is the likely location, the Pacific Ocean is certainly not crystal clear all over.
