Goofs

Live tree roots are in the sewer, even though super-heated fire blasted through it twice.

(at around 36 mins) When the firetrucks are en route to contain the Lava on Wilshire Avenue, Engine 23 is hit by a "Lava Meteor". When the crews get the concrete barriers into place (at around 1h 10 mins), the same Engine 23 pulls up to the barriers.

Roark turns the traffic around on Wilshire, but cars are still driving towards the volcano later on.

(at around 1h 35 mins) At the end of the film when the lava reaches the water, the waves are crashing and cooling the lava. In the overhead shot, the lava flows into a completely still channel.

The quake started at 5:14am. At 5:17, we see Roark headed east in the car on Wilshire Blvd. The family dog Max is not with them. It is revealed at the end of the movie that Roark left the dog with Emmett to keep him safe. But there's no way that Roark could've dropped off the dog at the office in that short amount of time. He was see in the doorway with Kelly when the quake started. The times between the events happening and the volcano happening at those points are confused.

(at around 27 mins) During the first big tremor, the city has a blackout, and goes completely dark. Car headlights, which are not attached to the power grid, should still be visible.

(at around 1h 13 mins) The water dropped from the helicopters would have most likely vaporized by the heat before it could actually hit the lava.

(at around 1h 5 mins) The K-rail wall was the wrong way round..If you look at the Hoover dam the arch is curved INTO the lake. This provides an arch that strengthens under compression. The arched K-rail wall to stop the lava would have been pushed apart under increasing pressure.

Helicopters fly around constantly, but the volcanic ash would've clogged the engines. No helicopters should be in the air.

(at around 1h 2 mins) During the movie the transit employee sinks into lava after saving the life of the unconscious train operator. Simply put, basaltic lava (~3g/cm^3) is more dense than humans (~1g/cm^3). So if a person where to fall onto lava they would not be able to sink into it, instead they would rest on top and get very badly burned by the 900+ degrees Celsius lava.

Eruptions that produce lots of flowing lava don't produce heavy ash fall. Eruptions that produce lots of flowing lava do sometimes produce heavy ash fall, depending on how much qualifies as heavy. The amount of ash fall in the movie is not inconsistent with the eruptions of lava. Mt. Etna erupts heavy ash fall and a lot of flowing lava. Kilauea produced a large ash cloud along with lots of flowing lava and there's other examples in places such as Iceland, South America, and Africa.

In the movie, magma rises through the San Andreas fault and hits Los Angeles. The San Andreas fault is a transform boundary, which means the plates move past each other, instead of opening and producing magma. Furthermore, the San Andreas Fault passes through Palmdale, over 35 miles northwest of Los Angeles. The magma does not rise through the San Andreas fault in the movie. It rises through the 6th street fault which is what the asphalt of the La Brea Tar Pits rises through. Also, Palmdale is not over 35 miles northwest of Los Angeles. It's about 20 miles northeast of it.

The sunrise is actually a sunset. One can see the sun dropping. The sun actual would rise over mountains east of Los Angeles.

The lava occasionally disappears within some shots.

A volcanologist mistakenly refers to "lava" (expelled molten rock) as "magma" (molten rock trapped within a volcanic chamber) on several occasions.

(at around 36 mins) When the fire truck is hit with a lava bomb and flips over, the truck starts to flip just before it is actually hit.

An overhead shot of Wilshire Boulevard shows lights on in the background, even though the city has no power.

(at around 26 mins) When Dr. Amy Barnes is entering into the steam pipe, the grate removed has the initials D.P.W. This should say D.W.P. for the Department of Water & Power as said throughout the film.

(at around 38 mins) When Mike beeps the horn for Kelly, his hand does not match with the horn. The horn actually sounds before he pushes it.

(at around 25 mins) A reflection of the camera and crew are visible on the train windshield when the train arrives to the station shortly before the (second) earthquake.

People who have been injured in the eruption are sent to Cedars Sinai Hospital. However, ground zero of the eruption is next to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, approximately 1.5 miles from Cedars Sinai. The hospital would certainly be evacuated because of its proximity to the center of the eruption.

In the movie, Wilshire Boulevard runs straight between Fairfax and Curson Avenues. In real life, it curves slightly to the north.

The quake started at 5:14 am. The train appears at 5:28 am. If you look closely at the train, you can see it move up and down. Did the train just stop 19 minutes after the first quake, or did the conductor try starting it again?

(at around 22 mins) In an early dialogue between Roark and Dr. Barnes, Roark asks her, "What's magma?". It's difficult to imagine anybody in Roark's position being unfamiliar with the word. (Correction) This is not a character error goof. A character error goof is when a character says something incorrect. Not when a character expresses unlikely ignorance.

(at around 1h 30 mins) Near the end of the movie, when Mike yells on the radio to abort, he's holding the radio backwards and talking into the bottom of the battery. Using a Motorola Saber like that ensures you won't be understood.

When the cul-de-sac is finished, despite speaking a very realistic-sounding, accent free German, the German reporter says: "... das wie ein Staudamm wirken soll, um das Lava zurückzuhalten ..." (" ... which is supposed to act like a dam to hold back the lava ..."), which contains an obvious error: Lava is female in German and not neutral, so he should be saying "die Lava" instead of "das Lava".