How Long Were They in the Air?
Minor quibble in the writing or is this part of the clues that we are supposed to be looking out for?
There appears to be a discrepancy in the amount of time the Losties were in the air. Several accounts below tell different stories.
In “The Other 48 Days” Ana Lucia becomes suspicious that Nathan (a fellow surivor) is in fact one of the Others. Her suspicions are solidified when he disappears into the jungle to go and releave himself. Ana justifying herself to Bernard for throwing Nathan in a pit then says, “We were in the air for 2 hours - I didn’t see him once - not once.”
Earlier in that same episode Cindy mentions that, “Before the crash, the pilot said we’d lost communication; we were turning back. We were flying for two hours in the wrong direction. ”
Click Here for the transcript.
Was it 2 hours in the air or 2 hours of flying in the wrong direction?
In the Pilot episode Jack, Kate and Charlie search for the nose section of the plane - looking for the transceiver. They come across the pilot of the plane. His account of the events are: “6 hours in. Our radio went out, no one could see us. We turned back to land in Fiji, by the time we hit turbulence we were 1000 miles off course. They’re looking for us in the wrong place.”
Click Here for the transcript.
The Pilot’s version is in line with Cindy’s story. A plane like that would travel around 500mph at a cruising altitude. That would put them 4 hours (and approx 2000 miles) between Sydney and LA when they lost contact with the ground. Then they changed course and started back to Fiji and flew in that direction for 2 hours.
Was Ana Lucia wrong? Seems to me that someone would know the difference between 6 hours in the air compared to 2. Also, since the statements contradicted themselves in the same episode I cannot accept that somehow this flaw got through the editing process. I believe that we were supposed to discover that there was a flaw in the timeline.
Now we know that there is a discrepancy of hours, how would you feel about a discrepancy of days? That post is coming soon.
When Ana Lucia made the statement about being in the air for two hours, she may have been 1.) so emotional during that conversation that she just picked a number of hours; 2.) referring to the time lapse from when the plane turned around; or, 3.) quoting the number of hours that she personally was awake during the flight and noticing the other passengers. The important fact to glean from the conversation between Ana Lucia and the other taillies is related to no one remembering Nathan.
Comment by Lena — March 7, 2006 @ 3:14 pm
I think that is a legitimate explanation. The only thing that keeps me wondering is the fact that no-one corrected her. She is standing in a group and uses this information to really solidify her case that Nathan is an over. I would assume that someone might suggest to Ana that she was way off on her time frame.
More importantly though is the fact that there are multiple issues with timing. This one just stood out because the contradiction occured in the same episode.
Comment by Administrator — March 7, 2006 @ 5:09 pm