Plot

A US Air Force pilot steals a nuclear bomb and sets off on what he believes is a divine mission against an American city.

A top US Air Force fighter pilot decides that his call sign of Black Angel means that he's a messenger of God. Freely committing murders as he goes, he steals a nuclear weapon and his plane. Taking a family hostage to help him, he works on bypassing the bomb's security lockouts so he can use it on the most sinful of American cities.—Anonymous

Captain Eddie Gordon (William O'Leary), a graduate of the United States Air Force academy, is a talented and aggressive pilot who proves too much for his fellow students to match. His flight instructor, Lieutenant Colonel Matthew Ryan (Peter Strauss) tries to encourage him to practice restraint, but with little success.

After his birthday party at his home in Las Vegas, Eddie puts a religiously motivated long-organized plan into action: He kills his simple-minded younger brother (Rodney Eastman) and both his dysfunctional and emotionally distant parents (Ben Rawnsley and K. Callan) by shooting them with a hunting rifle while they are watching a TV program. Eddie then holds Captain Melissa Gaiter (Patricia Sill) of the Air Force base at gunpoint and forces her to arm his IAI Kfir C1 aircraft with live ordnance, a radar-jamming pod and a low-kiloton tactical nuclear weapon. Melissa refuses to co-operate further and is murdered.

Later, Colonel Bill Douglas (James O'Sullivan) of the base's flight control is informed of the triple murder at the Gordons' residence while a training exercise involving Eddie is under way. Eddie takes this opportunity to shoot down his fellow students. Ryan manages to alert the base and tries to lure Eddie into the firing range of the base's surface-to-air missiles (SAMs). Eddie however, destroys the SAMs, Ryan's plane, and the airbase runway. Ryan successfully bails out.

Eddie lands in Garrison, Utah, to hide his jet in a deserted barn, but is accidentally discovered by a family on vacation, Richard (Michael Keys Hall) and Valerie (Michele Pawk) Dwyer and their baby. Before Valerie can raise the police on the CB radio, Eddie takes them hostage.

While Eddie works on defeating the fail-safes on the tactical nuke, he is exposed to lethal radiation, and his health quickly deteriorates. The next day, he and Valerie leave for a hardware store in a nearby city to obtain tools. Valerie uses a traveler's check and writes their hostage location on the back, but the dim-witted clerk (Scott Menville) does not notice. Valerie then persuades Eddie to go to a drug store to find a cure for his vomiting and nausea. She repeats the same practice; this time, the pharmacist (John D. Brancato) notices Valerie's notes on the check.

Two police officers (George Fisher and Steven D. Simpson) arrive at the barn to investigate. Eddie kills one and engages the other in a firefight. Richard and Valerie try to flee with their baby; however, Eddie shoots the second officer, and both Richard and Valerie. Richard dies while Valerie is seriously wounded and left for dead. Painstakingly, Valerie manages to collect her baby and crawl to the roadside, where she is picked up by a truck driver.

Ryan is cross-checking police leads when the report of Valerie Dwyer comes in. She insists that she has seen Eddie working on a bomb. Just before Valerie is to go in for a surgery for the bullet wound to her back, Ryan learns Eddie's target from Valerie: Las Vegas. Subsequently, Ryan convinces Douglas to concentrate on Las Vegas; he travels to Hill AFB to take an F-16 fighter plane to fly lead. An AWACS plane confirms what Valerie had said.

It has been determined that although Eddie cannot launch the bomb, his jet fuel could detonate the bomb if he is fired upon. Ryan successfully talks Eddie into chasing him out into the desert by provoking Eddie into a duel to see if God made him "the one". After evading Eddie's last missile, Ryan orders the other pilots to clear away, and then fires on Eddie. The missile hits and detonates the nuclear bomb in a massive explosion.

In the final scene, a recovering Valerie in her hospital room sees a news report about the nuclear explosion in the Nevada desert that killed Eddie, Ryan and around 36 other people on the ground just outside Las Vegas. The news report is somewhat sanitized as the news reporter asserts that the pilots were on a "training mission" in the area. Valerie knows the truth that the U.S. military is trying to cover up the actual reason for the nuclear detonation, but says nothing while she continues to hold her baby in her hospital bed.