Social Science Disasters

After is an astounding, inspiring, and exciting account of America in the first year of the September 12 era. Based on 347 on-the-record interviews and revelations from memos of government meetings, court filings, and other documents, award-winning journalist Steven Brill takes us inside the critical dramas of the year after the September 11 attacks, from the Justice Department's drive to find terror cells to Congress's decision to bail out the airline industry.

Kiwi nurse-midwife, Barbara Walker - who spent 20 years working for international aid agencies - shares her dramatic, heart-rending, and inspiring stories of the situations she faced and the people she sought to help. From the Sakeo One Refugee Camp in Thailand, where she cared for those fleeing Pol Pot’s regime in Cambodia in a make-shift bamboo-framed field hospital, to her last placement in Mozambique that ended due to a death threat, Barbara’s Christian faith gave her strength and kept her focused.

We are in the midst of a global refugee crisis. Sixty-five million people are fleeing for their lives. The choices are urgent, not just for them but for all of us. What can we possibly do to help? With compassion and clarity, David Miliband shows why we should care and how we can make a difference. He takes us from war zones in the Middle East to peaceful suburbs in America to explain the crisis and show what can be done, not just by governments with the power to change policy but by citizens with the urge to change lives.

The true story of a resilient circle of shrimp boat captains who faced and withstood the wreckage of Katrina but now find their courage tested by a greater threat: the disappearance of their livelihood and their centuries-old bayou culture.

DAS Buch zur Ahrtal-Katastrophe. In seinem multimedialen Tagebuch gibt Markus Wipperfürth, der als Spontanhelfer in den ersten Stunden nach der verheerenden Flutkatastrophe ins Ahrtal kam, einen exklusiven Einblick in seine Erlebnisse der ersten Tage, Wochen und Monate nach der größten Naturkatastrophe in der deutschen Nachkriegszeit.Der Pulheimer Landwirts, der durch seine enorme Reichweite in den sozialen Medien zum Katastrophen-Koordinator, Kommunikationsknotenpunkt und Schwarzen Brett des Ahrtals wurde und dringend benötigte Helfer, Hilfsgüter und Maschinen ins Katastrophengebiet gebracht hat.

On an August night in 1893, the deadliest hurricane in South Carolina history struck the Lowcountry, killing thousands—almost all African American. But the devastating storm is only the beginning of this story. The hurricane's long effects intermingled with ongoing processes of economic downturn, racial oppression, resistance, and environmental change. In the Lowcountry, the political, economic, and social conditions of Jim Crow were inextricable from its environmental dimensions.

A un año del desastre, esta obra investiga qué salió mal en 19 de los edificios más dañados por el temblor. ¿Por qué hubo tantos muertos 32 años después del terremoto de 1985? El libro, así, pinta cuáles son los problemas que resquebrajaron México... y alerta: si no se solucionan, volverá a ocurrir una tragedia similar.

L'infinito errore rivela la storia segreta della pandemia, una versione che le fonti ufficiali non ci hanno mai, ancora, raccontato. Grazie a testimonianze e informazioni inedite - tra cui l'analisi di oltre diecimila documenti e l'accesso alle banche dati che registrano l'identità genetica dei virus - questa inchiesta ripercorre l'intero viaggio compiuto dal coronavirus: dalle grotte infestate di pipistrelli ai laboratori cinesi dove i nuovi agenti patogeni sono stati studiati in collaborazione con i centri di ricerca americani.

Este libro es una hermosa exploración de lugares donde la naturaleza florece en nuestra ausencia. Algunas de las únicas reses verdaderamente asilvestradas del mundo deambulan por una isla abandonada desde hace tiempo en el extremo norte de Escocia. En los terrenos irradiados de Chernóbil ha resurgido una variedad de vida silvestre que no se había visto en mucho tiempo.

On the morning of May 9, 1980, harbor pilot John Lerro was guiding a 600-foot freighter, the Summit Venture, into Tampa Bay. Directly in the ship's path was the Sunshine Skyway Bridge. Suddenly, a violent weather cell reduced visibility to zero at the precise moment when Lerro attempted to direct the 20,000-ton vessel underneath the bridge. Unable to stop or see where he was going, Lerro drove the ship into a support pier.

In 2014, after fighting through yards of bureaucratic red tape, leaving her family, and putting her own health at risk in order to help suffering strangers, Kwan Kew Lai finally arrived in Africa to volunteer as an infectious disease specialist in the heart of the largest Ebola outbreak in history. What she found was not only blistering heat, inhospitable working conditions, and deadly, unrelenting illness, but hope, resilience, and incredible courage.

Tony Redmond is one of the few truly good people you will ever meet. His is a story of tireless hard work and astonishing bravery across wars, refugee crises, air crashes, earthquakes, typhoons, volcanoes and disease outbreaks for more than 30 years. Featuring stories of hope and redemption, as well as untold suffering and mismanagement, this unique account could only have been written one who has for decades performed incredible feats of altruism.

On December 3, 1999, the call crackled in to the men of the Worchester, Massachusetts Fire Department: a three-alarm warehouse blaze in a six-story windowless colossus of brick and mortar. What happened next - and how their lives and community were changed forever - offers an unprecedented look at these heroic men whose job it is to rush into burning buildings when everyone else just wants out.

One of the largest, fastest, and most beautiful ships in the world, the Andrea Doria was en route to New York from Italy. Departing from the United States was the much smaller Stockholm. On the foggy night of July 25, 1956, 53 miles southeast of Nantucket, the Stockholm sliced through the Doria's steel hull. Within minutes, the sea was pouring into the Italian liner. Eleven hours later, she capsized and sank into the ocean.

La historia que cautivó a millones de personas en todo el mundo, quienes fueron testigos de cómo fueron saliendo cada uno de los 33 mineros de las entrañas de la tierra. A 800 kilómetros al norte de Santiago, en pleno desierto de Atacama, pasado el mediodía del 5 de agosto de 2010, el tiempo se detuvo. Una roca gigante bloqueó el acceso principal de la mina San José, cercana a la ciudad de Copiapó, dejando atrapado a 33 mineros por 69 días.

In 2005, 15 workers were killed when BP's Texas City Refinery exploded. In 2006, corroded pipes owned by BP led to an oil spill in Alaska. Now, in 2010, 11 men drilling for BP were killed in the blowout of the Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico. What's next? In In Too Deep: BP and the Drilling Race That Took It Down, Stanley Reed - a journalist who has covered BP for over a decade - and investigative reporter Alison Fitzgerald answer not only that question, but also examine why these disasters happen to BP so much more than other large oil companies.

The key to understanding the calamitous Afghan war is the complex, ultimately failed relationship between the powerful, duplicitous Karzai family and the United States, brilliantly portrayed here by the former Kabul bureau chief for The Washington Post.

Can we human beings agree on a set of values which will allow us to confront the numerous threats that we and our planet face? Or will we continue our disagreements, rivalries, and antipathies, even as we collectively approach what, in the not impossible extreme, might be extinction? To answer these questions, A. C. Grayling considers the three most pressing challenges facing the world: climate change, technology, and justice.

In 1930, the Ohio Penitentiary caught fire shortly after inmates had returned to their locked cells after supper. In less than an hour, 320 men succumbed to fire and smoke in what remains the deadliest prison disaster in United States history.

Lengthy investigations revealed cover ups, covert operations, reckless corporate management, numerous safety violations, and a broken regulatory process. At the time of the spill, oil flowed through the Alyeska pipeline at a profit of $400,000 per hour, yet in the end, the 10,000 fishermen affected by the spill spent nearly 20 years in litigation and received little compensation for their losses. Despite a massive cleanup effort, oil remains on the beaches and continues to impact marine life.