The Baldwins and their two teen-aged children travel from Los Angeles to a vacation in the Rocky mountains, when in a distance they see the typical mushroom cloud of an A-bomb explosion over the LA skyline. With the highways clogged by panicking motorists, Baldwin and his family decide to head to the shelter of their fishing spot, there to wait until more news about the nuclear disaster is available. Everywhere they drive, however, the family is confronted by rampaging looters, heavily armed survivalists, and doped-up motorcycle punks. Attempting to remain calm and collected in the face of Armageddon, father Baldwin ends up as violent and animalistic as everyone else.