'Air Force Two', the aeroplane carrying the Vice-President of the United States and his staff, is flying over the South Pacific, when it's damaged by an electrical storm. It's forced to ditch in the ocean off the coast of the (fictional) country of San Pietro, near Solomon Islands.
After witnessing gangster Eddie Kim brutally beat U.S. Prosecutor Daniel Hayes to death in Hawaii, Sean Jones is escorted by FBI agents Neville Flynn and John Sanders on a Boeing 747-400 to testify in a trial in Los Angeles. Despite increased security for the flight, Kim arranges for a time-release crate full of venomous snakes to be placed in the cargo hold in an attempt to bring down the plane before it reaches Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). To ensure the snakes attack the passengers without being provoked, he has one of his henchmen disguised as an airport ground employee spray the passengers' leis with a special pheromone which makes the snakes highly aggressive. The crate opens midway through the flight and the snakes make their way through the cabin. A couple having sex in the bathroom, and a man using the bathroom are the first killed. The plane's captain, Sam McKeon, investigates and fixes an electrical short, but is killed by the viper that caused it. Co-pilot Rick, unaware of the snake, believes Sam has suffered a heart attack and continues toward LAX.
The miniseries presented a dramatization of the sequence of events leading to the September 11, 2001 attacks by Al Qaeda on the United States, starting from the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and up to the minutes after the collapse of the World Trade Center in 2001. The point of view of the movie is from two primary protagonists: John P. O'Neill, and a composite Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) agent, "Kirk". O'Neill was the real-life Special Agent in charge of Al Qaeda investigations at the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He died in the collapse of the Twin Towers on September 11 shortly after retiring from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and taking the position of Director of Security for the World Trade Center. The composite CIA agent "Kirk" is shown dealing with various American allies, especially Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Shah Massoud, in Afghanistan. In addition, "Patricia", a CIA headquarters analyst, represents the views of the rank and file at CIA headquarters. The miniseries features dramatizations of various incidents summarized in the 9/11 Commission Report, and represented in high level discussions held within both the Clinton and Bush administrations. The final hour of the movie dramatizes the events of 9/11, including a re-creation of the second plane entering the World Trade Center, Tom Burnett's calls to his wife, and John Miller's reporting near the scene of the attacks. The film concludes with information about the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, as well as the performance evaluation the Commission gave the government when it reconvened in 2005.
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The film begins with commentary by passenger Detective Graham Waters (Don Cheadle) having suffered a car accident with his partner Ria (Jennifer Esposito). He mentions that the denizens of Los Angeles have lost their "sense of touch." Ria and the driver of the other car, Kim Lee, exchange racially charged insults. When Waters exits the car, he arrives at a police investigation crime scene concerning the discovery of "a dead kid."
Kyle Pratt (Jodie Foster), a U.S. aircraft engineer employed in Berlin, Germany, is widowed with a six-year-old daughter Julia (Marlene Lawston) after her husband David (John Benjamin Hickey) falls off the roof of their building to his death. Kyle decides to bury him in their hometown back in the U.S., on Long Island, NY. They fly aboard a passenger aircraft, the engines of which Kyle helped design. After falling asleep, Kyle wakes to find that Julia is missing. She begins to panic, and Captain Marcus Rich (Sean Bean) is forced to conduct a search. None of the passengers remember seeing her daughter, Julia has no register in either the Berlin airport or the passenger manifest, and Kyle cannot find Julia's boarding pass. Marcus and the other crew members suspect that Kyle has become unhinged by her husband's death, and has imagined bringing her daughter aboard. One flight attendant Stephanie (Kate Beahan) is particularly unsympathetic. Faced with the crew's growing skepticism regarding her daughter's existence, Kyle becomes more and more desperate. Because of her increasingly erratic, panicked behavior, air marshal Gene Carson (Peter Sarsgaard) is ordered to guard and handcuff her.
Lisa Reisert (Rachel McAdams) arrives at the airport to take a red-eye flight from Texas back to Miami after attending her grandmother's funeral. While waiting in the check-in line, she meets Jackson Rippner (Cillian Murphy), who is boarding the same plane. After their flight is delayed due to bad weather concerns, they meet again at an airport bar and engage in small talk while they wait. When boarding, Lisa discovers to her surprise that Jackson is seated beside her.
Summer Pozzi (Lara Phillips), a Chicago-based flight attendant for an unnamed airline, is mentally preparing to quit her job and marry Jim, her soon-to-be airline pilot boyfriend. During a layover, she gets a phone call asking her to transfer to San Francisco. Then, Jim tells her he refused to take a final exam to be a pilot, unable to have the lives of many passengers on his shoulders. Shaken and disappointed, Summer decides to go ahead with the transfer, and promises herself not to fall for another man too quickly.
Because his mother is dying of a terminal disease, David (Benny Moshe) runs away from an abusive father and lives with other homeless children in a series of large concrete construction pipes. A few years later, David, who now goes by the name Tsotsi (Presley Chweneyagae), is the leader of a gang which includes his friends Butcher (Zenzo Ngqobe), Aap (Kenneth Nkosi) and Boston (Mothusi Magano). After getting involved in a murder committed by Butcher during a mugging, Tsotsi and Boston get into a fight which leaves Boston badly injured. Tsotsi later shoots Pumla (Nambitha Mpumlwana), a young woman, while stealing her car, only to discover a three-month-old baby boy in the back seat. Tsotsi hastily strips the car of its valuables and takes the baby back to his shack.
The movie begins by suggesting that friends and political allies of George W. Bush at Fox News Channel tilted the election of 2000 by prematurely declaring Bush the winner. It then suggests the handling of the voting controversy in Florida constituted election fraud.
When an Amacore oil rig in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia proves unproductive, Captain Frank Towns (Dennis Quaid) and co-pilot A.J. (Tyrese Gibson) are sent to shut down the operation and transport the crew (Ian, Kelly, Rodney, Davis, Liddle, Jeremy, Sammi, Rady, Kyle, Newman, and Dr. Gerber) out of the desert. However, en route to Beijing, a major dust storm disables one engine, forcing them to crash land their C-119 Flying Boxcar in an uncharted area of the Gobi Desert. Kyle falls to his death and the crash kills Dr. Gerber and Newman. Their cargo consists of used parts and tools from the rig, the rig's crew, and Elliot (Giovanni Ribisi), a hitchhiker. When the dust storm ends, it becomes apparent that they are 200 miles off course with only a month's supply of water. Jeremy (Kirk Jones), thinks about walking to get help, but Rady (Kevork Malikyan) explains that July is the hottest in the Gobi, and that he won't make it.
Nashawn Wade (Kevin Hart) has a horrible experience with a typical airline: his dog is classified as checked baggage instead of a carry-on, he eats a horrible airline meal, his buttocks gets stuck in the toilet during turbulence, and Nashawn's dog is sucked through a jet engine (after accidentally opening the cargo door). In response, he sues the airline and is awarded $100,000,000 by the jury. He decides to use the money to start his own airline, called N.W.A. (Nashawn Wade Airlines), whose acronym and logo are a pop culture reference to rap group N.W.A. The airline, specifically caters to African Americans and hip hop culture. The terminal at the airport is called the Malcolm X terminal, the plane is a heavily modified Boeing 747SP, customized with low-rider hydraulics, spinners, blended winglets to compensate for the drag from the decorations, and a dance club. The safety video is also a spoof of the Destiny's Child song "Survivor".
Filmmakers James Hanlon and the Naudet brothers were originally filming Tony Benetatos, a probationary firefighter of the New York City Fire Department assigned to the Engine 7/Ladder 1/Battalion 1 Firehouse on Duane Street in Lower Manhattan with the intention of making a film about the "probie's" first experience as a firefighter. On the morning of September 11, the firehouse, under the direction of Battalion Chief Joseph Pfeifer, was called out on a reported "odor of gas" at Church and Lispenard Streets. Jules rode with Pfeifer to investigate, while Gedeon stayed behind at the firehouse with the "probie.
Admiral McKee (Tom Skerritt) is retired, when following the events of 9/11 he receives a call from the White House informing him that his commander in chief requires him to serve his country once again. Shortly after this he is sworn into office as a senior member of the Office of Homeland Security under Tom Ridge. Once in office Admiral McKee faces the challenge of organising this new office so as to prevent further terrorist attacks against the United States. With this in mind Admiral McKee's wife, Elise Mckee, recommends he speaks to his friend, NSA Agent Sol Binder.