Jae-hyeok is a young man who works at the Hanbyul Nuclear Power Plant, which is the only thing providing the town with energy, and also provides most of the jobs. Jae-hyeok, who lost both his father and brother working at the plant in his early years, lives with his mother, sister-in-law, and nephew Min-jae. Jae-hyeok expresses his desire to leave the town and the plant behind him and work on a fishing vessel to make money for his family, but is discouraged by everyone he knows, including his childhood friend and fiancee, Yeon-joo.
Pyeong-seok is a member of the plant, who, among other workers and a group of anti-nuclear activists, tries to get the President of South Korea; Seok-ko Hang, to shut down the aging nuclear power plant, but their concerns are dismissed by the plant operators, especially the Prime Minister. The next day, while Jae-hyeok is working, an earthquake suddenly strikes the town, causing one of the nuclear reactors to overheat. Attempts to cool it down are botched, as water does nothing to stop it, and that due to the reactor's age, coolant valves were too severely damaged to be fixed in time.
Meanwhile, the administration fiercely debates allowing the reactor to vent radioactive particles into the air to relieve pressure from the core, eventually leading to evacuating at least those closest to the reactor first. This backfires when the reactor stack explodes from the pressure as the workers were too late to try and vent steam into the air, leading to a full nuclear meltdown. As the workers attempted to flee, the whole basement caves in, killing or injuring most of the crew. Jae-hyeok is one of the few to get out, and continues to get people to safety, until he collapses from nuclear radiation poisoning.
Meanwhile, the KCDC quarantines the town's residents not far from the reactor. After Yeon-joo, gets proof that the reactor exploded and delivers the news, the KCDC locks the town's residents in the evacuation center and put up an internet jammer, rendering their phones useless. Yeon-joo spreads the word and later the residents manage to break out and get back in the buses to continue evacuating. Back at a local hospital, situations grow tense as Jae-hyeok's health continues deteriorating, the medical team runs out of medical supplies and almost all the nurses have abandoned the sick and injured as public authorities also abandon the town, but he and several others were saved as a junior nurse decided to stay and treat the injured.
Despite the firefighters' efforts, the reactor is not cooling down and some firefighters start to suffer from radiation poisoning. Hang, after being demoralized for failing to handle the situation, finally regains control of the situation and orders the firefighters to use seawater to decommission the plant. Upon discovering that spent fuel rods are losing coolant due to the damage it sustained by the earthquake, Hang addresses live, requesting volunteers to seal the cracks of the tank to prevent coolant from escaping.
Jae-hyeok, although resentful and bitter, reluctantly agrees after Gil-seop convinces them to go. Jae-hyeok calls a distraught Yeon-joo before getting on a bus back to the town along with their surviving crew. Despite their efforts, the crack underneath the coolant tank grew bigger and they are ordered to retreat. Jae-hyeok, however, suggests they blow up the tank to allow the spent fuel rods to fall into the basement, effectively creating a new tank.
However, because of the growing cracks, there is no time to set up the bombs and then seal the door; both of these steps must be done all at once, meaning that one will not be leaving out alive. Jae-hyeok volunteers as he is the only person who can operate explosives. Having been exposed to too much radiation, and with no hope for escape, allows the workers to seal himself into the waste room and flee the area. In his final moments, Jae-hyeok uses his helmet-mounted camera to broadcast a farewell message to his family and Yeon-joo before blowing up the tank, killing himself in the process.
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