Snakes on a Plane

Factual error: One of the subplots involves a young boy ("Tommy") who is bitten by a cobra and the attempts to save his life. When they are working on his arm, it is horribly swollen & filled with fluid which they drain by cutting open his arm. Cobras secrete a neurotoxic venom which attacks the nervous system. It would not cause noticeable swelling at the bite site. The symptoms Tommy has would indicate a bite from a snake which secretes a hemotoxic venom (such as a rattlesnake), which attacks the blood stream & tissues, causing swelling.

Factual error: The altimeter is obviously fake. On a real altimeter there is no second hand and there are no numbers that indicate tenths of a foot. On top of that, the altimeter in the movie reads 3,000 feet when they hit 35,000.

Factual error: The plane being used is a Boeing 747. The first class cabin is upstairs, yet shown to have two aisles. The upstairs cabin in a 747 has only one aisle.

KaiGywer

Factual error: When the second toilet victim enters the plane's toilet, the overhead light is already on. In a normal airplane situation, the light only comes on once the door is locked.

Factual error: When the couple go into the restroom to have sex, they dis-engage the smoke detector, yet nothing happens. The pilot and the stewards would have been notified by alarm that the detector had been tampered with.

Factual error: When the flight crew declare a mayday, they talk to LAX tower. However, the tower's radios wouldn't have the range to receive these transmissions as the tower only controls the airspace directly around the airport. Likewise they would actually be talking to Oakland Oceanic Control (not Oakland Area Control Centre), as the sea area between the Western Seaboard and the Hawaiian islands falls under Oakland's FIR (flight information region), and thus the flight is their responsibility.

Factual error: When they track the down the snake keeper that had the snakes he was bitten. The snake expert went into the fridge for the anti-venom and it was already mixed in the vial. He then loaded a syringe with the antivenin. This is a major flaw. Antivenoms have to be mixed. They are never in a vial ready to go. They are always mixed and warmed in a solution prior to administration.

luchador

Factual error: When Neville Flynn is going to reset the breaker for the A/C he is in the cargo hold. He moves aside a shipping container, a unit load device (ULD). This unit load device had a big sticker across the top of the side. All ULDs are required by FAA regulations to have the identifying number on all four sides at the highest, most visible point. There was no identifying number on the front and there was none on the side. Where one belonged there was a big Pacific Air sticker. This was more than likely covering up the ULD number that was borrowed from another airlines.

luchador

Plot hole: The snakes escape from the locked box stored in the cargo hold when a small explosive bolt detonates and opens the lid. Post 9/11 all luggage placed in the cargo hold of an airliner would be tested for explosives, and anything larger than half a match head would be detected. The chances of getting an explosive bolt on board - nil. None whatever. You can also think of it this way - if the bad guys could somehow smuggle explosives on board, why bother with such an elaborate and flawed plan as letting snakes loose on the plane? Why not just smuggle a bomb on board? Pan Am 103 - the so-called Lockerbie flight - was brought down with a bomb that fit inside a small cassette player.

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Suggested correction: They wanted to make it look like an accident. If the snakes had done their job fully, plane crashes and no-one is the wiser. If the plane blew up halfway it would have screamed foul play. As it was in the movie it was just a terrible accident, a bunch of snakes being shipped got loose.

That doesn't correct the posting. The error is that they could not have smuggled a package equipped with an explosive bolt onto the airliner in the first place. It would have been detected and the package removed from the airliner and either defused or safely detonated. As for nobody being the wiser after the plane crashes, what were all those dead snakes doing scattered about the wreckage?

More mistakes in Snakes on a Plane

Neville Flynn: Enough is enough! I have had it with these motherfucking snakes on this motherfucking plane!

More quotes from Snakes on a Plane

Trivia: The poster for this movie features two snakes wrapped around a plane in a double helix style, with the film title across the middle, However some posters feature the same snakes/planes but with the title underneath. Take a closer look at this second type of poster and match each snake's head to its tail. if you match the right snaked head to the left tail the other snake head doesn't match up to the tail. Try this in any combination you like, ie. left head/left tail or right head/left tail. You will always be left with a head not matching a tail.

More trivia for Snakes on a Plane

Question: I live in Southern California and I can hear the snakes 50 yards away. Knowing that there were rattlesnakes on the plane, wouldn't people on the plane have heard them?

Answer: Rattlesnakes only make a noise when they are disturbed and some rattlesnakes will even strike without starting to rattle first.

Myridon

More questions & answers from Snakes on a Plane

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