Description: A group of commuter train passengers are put in accidental suspended animation and emerge years later into a devastated world. Government employee Harriet Ambrose is one of the passengers on a train from London to Sheffield but,u nlike her fellow travellers, she is aware that a disaster is about to happen. It is a huge meteor that falls on Birmingham,destroying life for many miles around but,as the train crashes,Harriet discharges a gas canister. A long while later the passengers awake from a state of suspended animation to find the surrounding countryside wholly wasted. Harriet is anxious to locate a colleague,Jonathan Geddes,whom she believes can help and she persuades the others to help her find him.