The plane is in real life a United Airlines DC-10, which is accurately shown as the plane is on the ground at Denver Stapleton Airport. However, on take-off (front view), the plane becomes a Pan Am DC-10, and while it is climbing, the American Airlines logotype is clearly visible on the tail.
When Flight Engineer Dudley Dvorak notices that the hydraulic quantity drops to zero, Captain Haynes asks him to turn on "backup systems", but they are also found unworkable. Haynes then states that "all three hydraulics lines at once" must have been destroyed. This exchange shows that the screenwriter misunderstands the way hydraulics work: the DC-10, like all airliners, has three different hydraulic lines (marked as red, blue and yellow), but they are used simultaneously in flight, as each of them controls different control surfaces of the aircraft - while the movie implies one of three is the main one and the other two are backup, used only when the main hydraulic line fails. (In fact, the DC-10 did not have any backup hydraulics: they are running through different parts of the airplane, so it was found improbable to have all three taken out at once with the exception of a total disintegration of the airliner; however, in case of UA232, when the turbine disc on the tailfin engine disintegrated, it ruptured shrapnel pieces all around, severing all three lines, as the red one ran just under the engine and blue and yellow lines ran through the tail fin in fairly close proximity.)
The aircraft involved in the crash was a DC-10-10 (DC-10 first series), and the aircraft seen taxiing on Denver Stapleton Airport is the correct one. However, on takeoff, an additional landing gear in the center of the fuselage is clearly visible. This feature was included only in the latter DC-10-30 and -40 series.
The Bat squadron is ordered to land on runway 31 and turn off taxiway Lima. However, there is no taxiway L at the KSUX airport. The highest taxiway letter used is G.
When the ground goodbye party is seeing off the pilot, it is early morning with the sun casting long shadows to the west. However when leaving a few seconds later, their shadows are cast north-north-west, meaning that it is close to noon.
The pilot of the small jet calls the tower "412 ready for takeoff" but the plane is actually taxiing through the transient parking just north-west of the tower, nowhere hear a runway and nowhere near takeoff.
The plane at the end is taking off at a completely different airport (and at a completely different time), as witnessed by the trees alongside the runway. There are no trees along either of the KSUX runways.