A business man plans to dump toxic waste on a state park, but it doesn't go according to plan.
After the whole North of the Equator freezes below zero, a group of people in Los Angeles risk their lives while trying to "escape" from the city's hostile conditions, in order to take a ship to a hotter place on Earth.
While Popeye Doyle is investigating what appears to be a very simple drug overdose, he becomes involved in international intrigue. The Mosad and various other foreign diplomatic figures turn up everywhere he goes. The drug overdose becomes a very involved murder case.
