Factual error: The movie was set in 1991, but there is a newspaper with a Kia advertisement. Kia's first U.S. cars arrived in 1994.
Factual error: In the rescue scene where the Coast Guard Cutter Tamaroa is picking up the downed helicopter crew, the Tamaroa is shown as a modern day cutter. The real Tamaroa is an old ship, which is about to be decommissioned. The real Tamaroa and the one shown in the movie are nothing alike. While the ships only differ by 5 feet (Tamaroa was 205' and the other 210'), the differences are more substantial because Tamaroa was built with a substantially lower center of gravity, which helped Tamoroa remain upright during the storm despite rolls of 55° in each direction (110°). The other cutter would likely have never have survived that storm. (01:22:00)
Factual error: When the men are watching movies, there's a copy of Blade Runner (Director's Cut) on the table. The director's cut was released in 1992, but this movie is set in 1991.
Factual error: The rough wave is going the wrong way. When they left the eye and entered the "Eye Wall" (the most powerful part of hurricanes), they suddenly meet that massive rogue. The problem is, the powerful rotating Eye Wall's forces push massive waves AWAY from the rotating center. The rogue in the movie was headed toward the hurricane's center, but the Eye Wall would have broken it down, demolished it and sucked into the rotating momentum of hurricane. It never happened.
Factual error: At the very beginning of the movie it says "Gloucester, Massachusetts 1991" and shows boats in the harbour including the Leisure Casino Cruises ship. Casino cruises did not start in Gloucester until 1997 or 1998.
Answer: Not a ship captain, but will take a shot. If a massive wave is close to cresting, as I seem to recall in this scene, the boat would have to climb a near vertical wall of water and would likely be flipped back and upside down by the advancing wave. Perhaps he was planning to gun the engine to penetrate the wall of the wave, and bob to the surface after it passed. Reversing the engine would just let the thousands of tons of water in the breaking wave smash down on the boat, crushing it.