Yes by all accounts the movie is a stinker.
When it comes to technical accuracy in a movie, the technical advisor is totally ignored so that Hollywood can weave its "magic" and dumbfound its unaware audiences of what is feasible.
Where do I start when trying to look for technical accuracy.....
Airport - The Original Movie:
Burt Lancaster and Dean Martin fly an ILS down to minimums while starring out the windows after a bomb is detonated on board their B707.
Who needs extemist Muslim Terrorists when disgruntled pax will do the same job?
Airport 75 - a Beech Baron smacks into the cockpit of a B747 killing 2 crew members and leaving a gaping hole where the F/O sat.
Charlton Heston is wisked away from one of his NRA meetings and is winched aboard by a chopper through the gaping hole only to save the day and land the stricken behemoth.
(Get me a bucket!!).
Airport 77 - the pax and crew survive a ditching as the aircraft sinks in about 75 feet of water.
No leaks of course and everyone is rescued.
They must have paid Jack Lemmon a fortune for that one !!!
Airport 80 - The Concorde:
Terrorists try and shoot down the Concorde (resplendant with an American pilot of course).
George Kennedy has the beasty doing barrel-rolls etc, then opens the cockpit window in flight and fires a flare to deflect/distract a heat seeking missile - all while he is flying of course - way to go Georgy!
Glad we keep those flares handy!!!
TOP GUN - dont get me started.
All I do know is that every GA pilot has a copy and the pilots love to quote lines from this tragic movie at bars and BBQ's.
Having been a guest at the Miramar Naval Air Station some years ago let me tell you a few home truths.
The pilots are really in their 30's and 40's.
The instructors are all veterans (aka Old Dudes!!) and they dont have washboard abs and designer flat-top hair-do's.
They come in all shapes and sizes, mainly tall and thin or short and stocky.
They were mainly married with kids and would rather be home than being on the volley-ball field showing off their toned bodies to the groupies.
All very professional and well behaved.
No Tom Cruise or Val Kilmers in that mob, although I was told both Tom and Val threw ****e-fits and refused to be seen by the movie-crews wiping up their own vomit from their pristine flying suits.
Air Force One - the list is endless.
Harrison Ford hit a new low with that one.
And what about our own Aussie gems....The Flying Doctors and Big Sky (I think it was called).
Pilots wearing their epaulettes on backwards, Nomads cranking up their turbine engines to the sound of a piston, pilots 600nm from Sydney at low level in the desert requesting radar vectors etc etc etc.
And just who was the Technical Advisor for those wonders??