NANCY MCKEON, THOMAS GIBSON, TONY AWARD WINNER BRIAN DENNEHY, ACADEMY AWARD WINNER DIANNE WIEST AND GOLDEN GLOBE AWARD WINNER RANDY QUAID STAR IN "CATEGORY 6: DAY OF DESTRUCTION," A NEW FOUR-HOUR EVENT MINI-SERIES TO BE BROADCAST SUNDAY, NOV. 14 AND WEDNESDAY, NOV. 17 ON THE CBS TELEVISION NETWORK

CATEGORY 6: DAY OF DESTRUCTION, a new four-hour event mini-series starring Nancy McKeon ("The Division"), Thomas Gibson ("Dharma & Greg"), Tony Award winner Brian Dennehy ("Death of A Salesman"), Academy Award winner Dianne Wiest ("Bullets Over Broadway"), and Academy Award and Emmy Award nominee and Golden Globe Award winner Randy Quaid ("Independence Day") will be broadcast as the "CBS Sunday Movie" on Sunday, Nov. 14 (9:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT) and Wednesday, Nov. 17 (8:00-10:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network. The natural disaster drama is about three enormous weather systems that ultimately collide over Chicago, creating the worst super-storm in the nation's history -- but only after they first cause the national power grid to collapse, making it impossible to warn anyone about the impending disaster.

A few days shy of retiring from his job as chief meteorologist for the National Weather Service's storm prediction center, Andy Goodman (Dennehy) begins to follow three separate and potentially devastating weather systems -- a cluster of tornadoes in the west, an unusually warm storm front in the south, and an Arctic system in the north. To help track the tornadoes in the west, which have already leveled Las Vegas, Andy enlists the aid of his friend and former colleague, "Tornado Tommy" (Quaid), an adventure tour operator who makes a living taking thrill-seekers up close and personal with twisters in Oklahoma's tornado alley.

Unaware of the weather systems that threaten to destroy the city of Chicago, Amy Harkin (McKeon), a smart and ambitious local television journalist is focused on reporting on the record heat wave and drought that have crippled the city for six weeks. The city's residents have been asked to reduce their energy consumption and have been warned by Secretary of Energy, Shirley Abbott (Wiest), that the outdated national power grid could fail at any moment, leaving hundreds of millions of people without power.

Mitch Benson (Gibson), Chief of Operations at Midwest Electric, a public utilities company, faces his own worst-case scenario when a severe thunderstorm destroys the city's primary power generating plant. Mitch and Amy must then race against time and the deadly forces of nature to restore power to the city so the public, as well as emergency workers, can be warned about the devastating storms which Andy has been tracking. Their goal is threatened when an electrical chain reaction cascades into the collapse of the North American power grid and causes a national blackout, just as the record-setting Category 6 storms finally collide over Chicago.

Nancy McKeon's television credits include the series "Touched by an Angel," "Style & Substance" and "Can't Hurry Love," all on CBS, and "The Division." Her television movie credits include "In My Sister's Shadow," "The Wrong Woman," "A Mother's Gift," "Love, Honor & Obey: Mafia Marriage," "Baby Snatcher" and "Firefighter," all on CBS, and "The Lightening Field," "A Cry For Help: The Tracey Thurman Story," "This Child is Mine," "Poison Ivy" and "High School U.S.A." Her feature film credits include "Just Write," "Teresa's Tattoo" and "Where the Day Takes You."

Thomas Gibson is best known for his five years as a lead in the comedy series "Dharma & Greg." His additional television credits include a starring role in the CBS series "Chicago Hope," the movies "Raising Waylon," "The Inheritance" and "Brush with Fate," on the Network, "Tales of the City," "A Will of Their Own" and "The Lost Empire," and the mini-series "The Kennedys of Massachusetts." Gibson made his feature film debut with a starring role in the epic drama "Far and Away" and has since appeared in films such as "The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas" and "Eyes Wide Shut."

Brian Dennehy won a Golden Globe Award and an Emmy nomination for his portrayal of Willy Loman in the television movie "Death of a Salesman." He also won a Tony Award for the same role in the theatrical production of the play. Dennehy also appeared on Broadway in "Translations." His other theatrical credits include "A Touch of the Poet," "The Iceman Cometh" and "Galileo." Dennehy's television movie credits include "Fail-Safe," "Three Blind Mice" and "The Crooked E: The Unshredded Truth About Enron," on the Network, as well as "Shadow of the Doubt," "Day One," "Foreign Affairs," "Perfect Witness" and the mini-series' "Burden of Proof," "To Catch a Killer," "Murder in the Heartland" and "A Killing in a Small Town." His feature film credits include "Presumed Innocent," "Cocoon," "Gorky Park," "10," "Legal Eagles," "First Blood," "Never Cry Wolf," "Summer Catch" and Baz Luhrman's "Romeo & Juliet."

Dianne Wiest's feature film credits include "Bullets Over Broadway," "Hannah and Her Sisters," both of which earned her an Academy Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role, "I Am Sam," "The Horse Whisperer," "The Birdcage," "Edward Scissorhands," "Parenthood," "Cookie," "Bright Lights, Big City," "September" and "Radio Days." Her television credits include the series "Road to Avalonea," for which she won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series, and "Law & Order," the television movie "The Simple Life of Noah Dearborn," on the Network, and the mini-series "The 10th Kingdom."

Randy Quaid's feature-film credits include "Home on the Range," "The Last Detail," for which he earned an Academy Award nomination as Best Supporting Actor, "The Last Picture Show," "Paper Moon," "The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz," "Midnight Express," "The Long Riders," "Texasville," "Kingpin," "Independence Day," "National Lampoon's Vacation," "Days of Thunder" and "Pluto Nash." Quaid's television movie credits include "The Brotherhood of Poland, New Hampshire," on CBS, his Emmy Award-nominated and Golden Globe Award-winning role in "LBJ: The Early Years," as well as the mini-series "Ruby Ridge: An American Tragedy," on CBS, "A Streetcar Named Desire," "Purgatory," "The Thin Blue Lie" and "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation: Lost."

CATEGORY 6: DAY OF DESTRUCTION was produced by von Zerneck/Sertner Films. Robert M. Sertner and Frank von Zerneck ("Scott Turow's Reversible Errors," "The Elizabeth Smart Story," "We Were the Mulvaneys") are the executive producers. Dick Lowry ("Attila") directed from a script by Matt Dorff ("Nowhere to Land"). Randy Sutter and Leslie Belzberg are the producers; Craig Weiss and Glenn Campbell ("Frank Herbert's Children of Dune," "From the Earth to the Moon") are the visual effects supervisors.

RATING: To Be Announced