Continuity mistake: After Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt chase the first tornado they switch to Bill's new truck. They look at the speedometer once then they look at again about 3 seconds later and the odometer is hundreds of miles different than it was only 3 seconds before. Furthermore, the truck has gained a quarter gas tank in a blink and has the airbag warning light turned on.
Continuity mistake: At the beginning of the movie, the first time we see Jo's and her parents' house, there are several fairly close-up shots showing the porch and yard. These scenes are clearer during the flashes of lightning. There is nothing in the yard, close to the right side of the porch (as we are looking at it) except tall grass and a few small bushes right next to the porch. When the family comes out of the house to go to the cellar, there is a good-sized, red toy tractor sitting in the yard now.
Continuity mistake: When we see the dog Mose in the movie he looks very young (2-3 years old). But in the scene when Bill and Joe's storm chasers crew watches Jonas's van gets picked up by the F5 tornado, the dog Mose has aged 5-6 years (when dogs age the fur around the face turns white).
Continuity mistake: During the first tornado, Beltzer says the twister is about three miles away. You later see Bill turn the truck off the road directly onto that dirt path, not ten yards away. The tornado then arrives and sucks Jo's truck into the air. After the tornado, Melissa is driving along and says, "Oh my God" as the tornado disappears, back to about three miles away.
Continuity mistake: In the garage scene, an air hose comes on and Preacher grabs it. When he is hit by a hub cap and lets go of the hose, the air switches off.
Continuity mistake: When we see Melissa at Aunt Meg's house, she is in the same 3-piece white suit she's been wearing since the start of the movie and it is still spotless - even after Bill, dirty, muddy and wet from the first tornado, hugs her.
Continuity mistake: About halfway through the film, when they all take shelter in the garage near the drive in movie, when the 'Drive In Movie' sign goes crashing through the garage wall you can clearly see a large metal chain pulling it through.
Continuity mistake: When Bill and Melissa go out to get the divorce papers from Jo, we see Bill pull his truck up with Rabbit and Allan's truck (hood up) in the background. We see it closer up when Bill asks Dusty, "Where's Jo?" But when the scene comes back to Bill and Dusty and then shows Melissa, Rabbit, Allan and the truck have disappeared. When Dusty is holding Melissa's hand and walking to sit in his chairs, Rabbit & co. are in the background again.
Continuity mistake: When the telephone pole falls on the bed of Paxton's truck, the pole dents the bed. In the scene before the pole falls, there is a dent on the bed.
Continuity mistake: As Bill and Jo pass the camera position, the red lights on Dorothy are flashing. A moment later, Bill actives Dorothy, including the lights.
Continuity mistake: At the beginning of the drive-in scene Jo and Bill give each other a long look. During this you can see that Jo passes the same Pepsi sign twice.
Continuity mistake: When Bill & Jo leave the aunt's house in the red truck, it shows the truck has a back sliding window - the next shot there is no back sliding window.
Continuity mistake: When Bill is walking over to see Jo for the first time, he passes Joey working on the hood of a truck that was previously shown in front of the blue Doppler van and next to the green tractor. Throughout this sequence, this taupe/brown pickup with camper flops back and forth between the two places. Lawrence finally drives it off.
Continuity mistake: In the first few seconds of the movie, there's a landscape shot of a fence. Right in front of the fence there's a little piece of grass blowing in the wind, and it's just so obvious that they looped the 1 second to make it last 5 seconds, because the grass keeps jumping back and forth. Minor but annoying.
Continuity mistake: After the pitstop, when Jo's team and Jonas's team have the encounter, Jo's team takes off to chase another tornado. When we hear Dusty holler, "Hey you guys, woohoo," we see Jo reach for the CB and dial from channel 22 to 18. But when Bill says, "Shi_," Jo reaches down to adjust the CB and the channel showing is 39.
Continuity mistake: At the beginning, when the guy comes back to have Jo sign the divorce papers, He says "you missed one", and you can see a red tab on the paper that she missed. In the next scene it's gone and in the next it's back again.
Continuity mistake: After the first twister they chase, Jo's hair is covered in mud and dirt. Then minutes later in the red truck her hair is clean and fixed nicely.
Continuity mistake: When all of the crew are heading to the F5 tornado, in the truck, you can see that the dog is in the front of the truck and at the same time, under a table on the back of the truck.
Continuity mistake: In the scene immediately before the gas tanker blows up in front of the truck, the passenger window of the truck is wide open. As the truck clears the explosion, the window is closed.
Continuity mistake: When the red truck is driving to the tornado where the sensors spill, the scenery and pavement change between shots. First, they are driving down a road with trees on both sides. Then, they are driving down a large empty area where you can see the the horizon. Finally, they drive into a valley with forests on both sides. And this happens in a matter of seconds.
Suggested correction: The scale back then was based on the size of the tornado, it's only more recently it is based on damage. So during the time of the movie, the scale was being used correctly for size not damage.
The Fujita scale was introduced in 1971 and was in use during the 90's when this film came out. The Fujita scale measured the damage caused by a tornado to man-made structures after ground or aerial surveys, it was not a measurement of tornado size (an F5 tornado is a tornado that's rated on the Fujita scale). It is true the Fujita scale was replaced by the enhanced Fujita scale in 2007, but that was only to align the ratings to the damage better, it did not change rating tornadoes from size to destructive powers.
Bishop73