Brilliant Oklahoma storm chaser Peter Jensen looses his wife Mary in an unpredictable tornado. Emotionally wrecked, he moves to Portland, in the safe north. Ten years later, he visits his mother in law Margaret Harrington to attend his daughter Kara's graduation. She accepted a job with her lover, Dr. John Tedesco, in Dr. Raymond Ardmore's new epidemiological institute, EDAC. John worries it be unsafely built by a dodgy contractor. Peter's former assistant Robert Booker shows him new research, which indicates monster storms ahead. TV reporters Jerry and Julia taken an interest in both. But the risks collide.