Plot hole: This film is set in 2004. The thought that no search and rescue operations would be put in place after an aircraft disappeared from radar during a routine flight is absurd. The Chinese are paranoid about intrusion on their territory and the downed aircraft would have been located by a simple satellite search within hours of it crashing. Chinese military satellites crisscross the Gobi and they are equipped with optical cameras, microwave and infrared detectors and radar, so spotting a metal aircraft on the ground would be simple even if it was hundreds of kilometres off course. The crew would have been visited by Chinese military helicopters (and probably arrested!) as soon as the storm had died down.
Flight of the Phoenix (2004)
1 plot hole
Directed by: John Moore
Starring: Dennis Quaid, Hugh Laurie, Giovanni Ribisi, Tyrese Gibson, Miranda Otto, Tyrese
Factual error: After calculating the amount of water they have available Townes and A.J. announce they will be living on "a pint of water per person per day". One problem - they'll be dead within three days, if they manage to last that long. A GALLON - eight pints - a day is the absolute minimum in conditions of dry, extreme heat such as they are experiencing, and that is for a resting male. Take their strenuous exercise into account and you can push that up to two gallons a day. One pint a day? Forget it.
Sammi: I thought you weren't religious, Rady?
Rady: Spirituality is not religion. Religion divides people. Belief in something unites them.
Question: How realistic is Elliot's plan of building a new plane?
Answer: A flying version of the design about 1/2 scale was built and flown for the original 1965 film. It appears in several flying scenes in that movie, but tragically crashed during filming, killing stunt pilot Paul Mantz.
Answer: Completely realistic. As explained correctly in the film, the aerodynamic principles involved are valid. Given that the constructed aircraft would have oversized wing surface area and an excess of power available, it should fly. Disruption of the airflow over the top of the wing due to the passengers would be minimal. In the 1930's airshows featured multiple wing walkers atop much smaller and lower powered aircraft.
Answer: Stupidly unrealistic. The plane simply wouldn't fly with people hanging off its wings for a start.
There's a big difference between a single wing walker on a high lift biplane compared to 10 people hanging off the wings.
Search on "multiple wing walkers" and see a 160 hp biplane carrying 5 walkers. So, for the C-119 there is about 2894 square feet of wing area, call it 2000 after cut down. The PW R-4360 produces 3500 hp, but let's use only 30% of that to protect the cobbled airframe. 10 guys on the wings are going to disrupt airflow over about 12 square feet each leaving about 1880 square feet of unobstructed wing being driven by 1000 hp. 30 people on the wings would not stop it from flying.
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Suggested correction: The Chinese government, for whatever reason, may have denied there was any crash at all if it suited their purposes, and the oil company that owned the plane would have little recourse. The Chinese have done this before. For the purpose of the plot, the survivors decided that they had to save themselves rather than wait for rescue and that was completely plausible.
Suggested correction: It's now 2021, and we still can't find Malaysian Airlines MH370. So this suggestion of planes always being found is laughable.
stiiggy
MH370 crashed into the ocean, and in fact some wreckage has been found. The Chinese military does not have the south Indian Ocean under satellite surveillance 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, unlike the Gobi desert where a crashed plane would be spotted within hours of it going missing.