The Day the Earth Caught Fire

Journalists of the London Daily Express investigate reports of strange phenomena occurring all over the world, such as flooding in the Sahara, unseasonable blizzards in New York, and violent tornadoes in the Soviet Union. All over England, temperatures are on the rise, girls in bikinis are everywhere, and mists are blanketing the Thames River. Top scientists at the Meteorological Center refuse to give any official explanation, which makes the newspaper editor suspicious. He orders science reporter Bill Maguire and alcoholic columnist Peter Stenning to dig for information. When Peter begins a romance with Met Center secretary Jeannie Craig, he learns from her certain clues that there has indeed been a cover-up, and he begins to sober up, so that he may win her love. Ten days before this movie begins, two nuclear bombs had been exploded, one at the North Pole by the Soviet Union, the other at the South Pole by the United States. Nobody noticed before now that they were set almost simultaneously, until the Chief Editor, in a conference with his reporters, draws a line from London to New Zealand, showing the path that floods and other catastrophes have created in a devastating line. Stenning gathers from hints Jeannie gives him that the two explosions shifted the Earth's orbit and set it on a course toward the sun. As water becomes scarce, the British government takes emergency measures to control hysteria, rampant looting, and rioting by teenagers. The only possible solution is for another explosion of bombs that will restore the Earth's orbit. On detonation day, Stenning heroically makes his way through a wasteland to the newsroom to write a story that will prepare for the results of the blasts. He instructs the typesetters to prepare two front pages. One has the headline "World Saved", and the other "World Doomed".