Rlvlk

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes - S1-E1

Factual error: When the new secretary is being shown around the office, the cover is slipped off an IBM Selectric typewriter. She is told not to be afraid of the new technology, it was made easy enough for a woman to use. The episode takes place in March 1960 (a calendar is shown) and the IBM Selectric wasn't introduced until 1961.

Rlvlk

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes - S1-E1

Factual error: The ad team is trying to come up with a new campaign for Lucky Strike cigarettes, since all health claims must be removed. With a stroke of genius, the slogan "It's toasted" is created and approved. "It's toasted" was the ad campaign that debuted in 1917. In the early 60s, it was "Lucky Strike separates the men from the boys, but not from the girls".

Rlvlk

Evaluation Day - S1-E22

Plot hole: A head without a body is found early in the show. Then, a body that has been decapitated, skinned, and severed of hands and feet is found. The CSI team assume the two are related until the coroner states that the body isn't even human. He also mentions that he has no idea what kind of animal it is and they'll need to consult an anthropologist. Everyone is shocked to learn the body is that of a gorilla. The body is humanoid (2 arms, 2 legs). It is larger than human size. The only thing it can possibly be is a gorilla. It must be a primate for having a humanoid shape and must be a gorilla because that is the only primate larger than man. There was no need to bring in an anthropologist (which should have been a zoologist if they truly had NO idea what kind of animal it was). It should have been painfully obvious to the CSI team, who are experts in all fields, that the body was a gorilla.

Rlvlk

Overload - S2-E3

Other mistake: When Grissom goes to the crime scene to investigate, he finds the worker's drill hanging over the edge, still plugged in. Dropping the drill (35-45 pounds) 5-6 feet (the height of the worker) over the edge would have ripped the plug from the outlet and cause the drill to fall all the way to the ground with the victim. (Grissom barely puts any effort into unplugging the drill when he inspects it).

Rlvlk

Overload - S2-E3

Factual error: Grissom sets up a little experiment to see if the deceased's blood is conductive to electricity. All are amazed when the blood does conduct electricity. All blood is naturally conductive. As a matter of fact, cardiac output is measured as a function of blood conductivity.

Rlvlk

Overload - S2-E3

Factual error: Several problems surround the electrocution death and the investigation. First, there is the insinuation that the boots should have protected the victim from the electrocution because of the rubber soles. Regular shoes and standard work boots will not protect anyone from electric shock. You are still grounded. You have to wear special electrician's boots to insulate you from electric shock. These boots cost about triple standard work boots. Second, the CSI crew found a nail embedded in the boot. They theorized that is how the boots were grounded out. The problem there is the nail had to be pushed all the way through the sole and through the insole for it to work (the close up of the boot showed the nail in all the way). Even if the nail was barely through the insole, the victim would have felt the nail poking him at every step. With the nail all the way through, he wouldn't have even walked two steps before puncturing his foot on the nail. Third, there is the nail itself. When Grissom is examining the boots trying to find why they failed (failed to prevent the electrocution), he poses the question "What is the most common item found during construction?" The answer is a nail, and the nail in the boot appears to be a roofing nail. The construction site is for a multi-story prison. Nails aren't used in the construction of multi-story urban buildings: concrete and steel are. Carpenters come in after the building is erected and work on the interior, but there are no roofing nails.

Rlvlk

Cats in the Cradle... - S2-E20

Deliberate mistake: A father, daughter (both construction\demolition experts) and the boyfriend try to frame the husband for attempted murder by planting a pipe bomb in her (wife\daughter\girlfriend's) car. The bomb is a stick of dynamite inside a pipe with 2 endcaps on it. A pipe is used to hold a improvised munition together: i.e., homemade explosives, or something like Anfo. The pipe provides the casing for the explosive material. Or, it is used to keep the shrapnel fragments around the explosives (like nails or pellets around a stick of dynamite). For dynamite, you simply drill a hole (in rock, in concrete, in whatever.) and drop the stick in. It needs no extra casing. The family would have known that. But the CSI crew needed some evidence to analyze and the blasting cap + detonator circuit would have given them nothing to study. The endcap with the hole drilled for the blasting cap was the case solver.

Rlvlk

Cut - S15-E6

Continuity mistake: During an interview with ADA Southerlyn, one of the former patients states when she woke up, her left side felt like a lead weight. She was told she had a stroke while under anesthetic. However, the entire time she is talking, it is the right side of her face that is exhibiting signs of the stroke.

Rlvlk

Blood Drops - S1-E7

Factual error: The show falls into the Hollywood myth on polygraphs. Jesse is given a polygraph test after pleading guilty to the 4 murders. He answers all questions, except the last one, honestly. The 4 traces on the polygraph show no real movement on these questions. On the final question, Jesse lies and all 4 traces spike. If polygraphs actually did that, they would be admissible in court. But the reality is, it is the opinion of a highly trained operator that decides if there is a lie. The average person could not look at a polygraph results and point out a lie. There is no huge, visible spike. The producers could have replaced the 4 traces with a red\green light: Green is an honest answer and red a lie.

Rlvlk

Blood Drops - S1-E7

Continuity mistake: Sara takes pictures of Brenda with an UV light camera. The camera used to film the episode for broadcast is barely able to show the walls in the background as tiled. When the UV pictures of Brenda are used in the interrogation, the photos show Brenda's back up against the tile wall.

Rlvlk

Crow's Feet - S5-E4

Plot hole: Two women die after a medical error occurs after undergoing an "anti-aging" medical procedure. A 30% solution of hydrogen peroxide is given intravenously instead of a 3% solution. According the the Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) a 30% solution is extremely corrosive and will blister skin on contact. 1) How did the women not bolt upright screaming as this extremely corrosive solution was pumped throughout their veins. 2) How did they not die in the clinic instead of the hours after as depicted in the show? Even in the CSI crew little experiment, the red blood cells immediately burst when exposed to the 30% solution.

Rlvlk

Iced - S5-E23

Plot hole: How did the occupant of the room where the dry ice was placed only burn his index finger when he picked it up? His thumb, other fingers, and palm were all undamaged. Was he wearing special gloves that had only the index finger missing when he picked up the dry ice?

Rlvlk

Iced - S5-E23

Continuity mistake: In the opening scene, the female student is wearing green panties. When the two bodies are found, she is wearing red panties. It was a murder behind a locked door, so no one changed them for her.

Rlvlk

Iced - S5-E23

Plot hole: The bodies were pink because of exposure to the lower temperatures created by the dry ice venting into the room. None of the CSI team noticed a chill when they entered the room? None of them noticed the bodies were cold to the touch? No one noticed that the body or liver temperatures didn't match with the estimated time of death?

Rlvlk

Iced - S5-E23

Factual error: The murderer kills the two students by drilling a hole through the adjoining wall of the victim's room at floor level, placing 40lbs of dry ice next to the hole, and allowing the sublimating carbon dioxide to pass through the hole into the victim's room and creating a toxic atmosphere. Since the two rooms are at the same air pressure, the only possible way for the CO2 to move from one room to the next is to be pumped through. As neither room has an excessive level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere the sublimating gas would fill both rooms until the CO2 levels in both rooms was the same.

Rlvlk

Grave Danger (2) - S5-E25

Other mistake: There is no way a body can be pulled out of a grave the way they showed. It would be a pretty tough trick to pull off with a 6', 200lb piece of lumber and virtually impossible with a body. If it was a solid, non-flexible piece of material, pulling on the rope would drag the item until it hit a ledge and then flip it out of the grave. The body is very flexible, especially at the waist. You'd have to pull a body from above, which they end up doing in real life.

Rlvlk

Grave Danger (2) - S5-E25

Continuity mistake: There are some major continuity errors in the rescue scene at the end: First, the loader is missing from the side of the grave during several of the shots. Second, the rope changes position. The CSI crew is shown manning the rope, which is running parallel to the ground, ready to pull Stokes out of the grave. (There is a physics problem with this anyway.) The next shot is a close up of Grissom and Brown and the rope is now going up at a severe angle. Brown can barely reach it. (The stuntman can only be pulled out from above, the aforementioned physics problem, and the rope is leading up to the rigging.) Third, immediately after the stuntman is pulled from the grave and right before the explosion, there is no one and nothing near the grave. The loader ends the scene right where it started: on the edge of the grave, bucket up, lights on.

Rlvlk

Regeneration - S2-E23

Other mistake: Two Borg are discovered North of the Arctic Circle. One is covered in ice, the other encased in ice. Carbon dating shows the wreckage to be over 100 years old (to tie it in with Star Trek:First Contact). The Borg are inactive and unable to repair themselves until they are "defrosted". The temperature above the Arctic Circle doesn't usually drop below -100°F. The Borg have been shown to work very well in the vacuum of space which is 3-4K (roughly -454°F). If they can survive that, even being frozen in a solid block of ice would not slow them down. The nanites have to be in their "blood" and operate at the cellular level. That cannot be damaged by re-entry and the crash. [This is one of those entries that keeps being corrected and recorrected - I'll leave it up to people to make up their own minds.]

Rlvlk

Death Defying - S2-E10

Continuity mistake: Near the beginning when Mason takes the notebook from Roxy, the camera is off the corner of the table showing all four seated at the booth. Roxy reaches across the table with one hand and for her gun with the other and starts to explain she will shoot Mason. The camera moves for a close up on Roxy and her hands are now in front of her, folded on the table.

Rlvlk

Death Defying - S2-E10

Continuity mistake: In the bar, just after Ray lost a pool game to Mason, they are watching a boxing match on TV. Ray begins to rack the balls and pulls out 4-5 balls and places them in the rack. The camera switches back and forth, Ray again pulls 4-5 balls out and racks them, but the original ones are gone. The camera switches back and forth again and when Ray is done racking the balls, the balls are in a different order than he placed. He is watching Mason, not looking where he places the balls. Watch the 2 and 11 balls.

Rlvlk