Corrected entry: The crew crashes into the Gobi Desert, which is in Northern China. Yet the people are speaking Cantonese, which is the local dialect for Southern China (Quangzhou/Hong Kong area), instead of Mandarin (the official language) or any of the Northern dialects.
Corrected entry: After the lightning hit the plane, A.J. comes running to see if the captain and Elliot are okay. When he is under the wing, he touches it. But after lightning has hit this wing, he never could have touched it, his fingers would have melted.
Correction: Like all metal framed aircraft the C119 is designed to survive lightning strikes by conducting the electricity through the main spar and out of the wingtips. Not being earthed, a lightning strike on an aircraft is nothing serious and this film hugely exaggerates the damage for dramatic effect. There might be a flicker of the instruments and a pretty impressive bang, but the temperature of the aluminium skin would definitely not increase.
One of the biggest misconceptions about electricity melting metal is that metal has to earthed for electricity to melt it. This is simply not true. Electricity can, and does melt unearthed metal.
First, metal doesn't have to be earthed, or grounded for electricity to melt it. That's just a common belief. Electricity can and does melt unearthed, and ungrounded metal objects. Second, the metal aircrafts are made of don't offer complete protection against lightning even though it's built to survive lightning strikes. They are built to survive lightning strikes by conducting electricity through the main spar, and their wingtips but their metal frame is not perfect.
Actually lightning can heat up metal objects whether their earthed or not contrary to the common belief that they have to be earthed for lightning to heat them up. Also while metal framed aircraft are designed to survive lightning strikes their not perfected. Lightning can and does damage or destroy them.
Correction: What people? They're in the middle of an empty desert. If you're talking about the nomads: well... they're nomads. That means they're from all over. They could speak any language, Chinese or not. Just because they currently live in the Gobi doesn't mean they're originally "from that area."
Phixius ★