City of Dust: Illness, Arrogance, and 9/11
- By Anthony DePalma
- Published Aug 13, 2010 by FT Press. Part of the FT Press Science series.
- Copyright 2011
- Dimensions: 6 X 9
- Pages: 352
- Edition: 1st
- Book
- ISBN-10: 0-13-138566-6
- ISBN-13: 978-0-13-138566-5
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Product Author Bios
Anthony DePalma spent 22 years as a reporter and foreign correspondent for The New York Times. After 9/11, he wrote many of the Times' Pulitzer Prize winning "Portraits of Grief", and spent four years covering the environmental and health consequences of Ground Zero for the paper. In 2008, he became writer in residence at Seton Hall University. A 2007 Emmy finalist for "Toxic Legacy," he previously earned the prestigious Maria Moors Cabot Prize for distinguished international reporting. DePalma's books include Here: A Biography of the New American Continent and The Man Who Invented Fidel.
In City of Dust, Anthony DePalma offers the first full accounting of one of the gravest environmental catastrophes in United States history. The destruction on 9/11 of two of the world's largest buildings unleashed a vortex of dust and ash that blotted out the sun and has distorted science, medicine and public policy ever since. The likely dangers of 9/11's massive dust cloud were evident from the beginning, yet thousands chose not to see. Why? As the sickening results of exposure became evident, many still refused to recognize them. Why? The consequences are still being tallied in the wasted bodies and disrupted lives of thousands who gave their all when the need was greatest, but whose demands for justice have been consumed by years of politics and courtroom maneuvers. Why?, separating reality from myth - and doing so with exceptional literary style and grace. DePalma covered Ground Zero for The New York Times for four years. DePalma introduces heroic firefighters, dedicated doctors and scientists, obsessive city officials, partisan politicians, aggressive lawyers, and compassionate judges and reveals the individual decisions that destroyed public trust, and the desperate attempts made to rebuild it. The dust that was the World Trade Center has changed everything it touched. This is the story of that dust, the 9/11 disaster after the disaster, and what it tells us about ourselves and our future.
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19 of 20 people found the following review helpful
"touched by the dust", By
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This review is from: City of Dust: Illness, Arrogance, and 9/11 (FT Press Science) (Hardcover)
On September 11, the collapse of the Twin Towers hellishly covered everything in a given radius in inches of pulverized, "highly caustic cement dust" laced with asbestos, benzene and "other dangerous elements." People running away were blizzardized with these toxic materials. Nearby buildings, including residences, were infiltrated. And rescue workers who came to the massive pile of WTC debris to search for survivors and fight the ongoing fires breathed the stuff in for days on end.City of Dust: Illness, Arrogance, and 9/11 is a thoroughgoing examination of the contours of the health crisis that followed from this poisonous dusting (at thick as four inches close to the epicenter) of New York City. Author Anthony DePalma reports on every aspect from adverse symptoms attributed by sufferers to the dust to medical efforts to treat... Read more
31 of 36 people found the following review helpful
I read this book straight through., By
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This review is from: City of Dust: Illness, Arrogance, and 9/11 (FT Press Science) (Kindle Edition)
A definite buy if you are interested in the details of the 9/11 attacks and their aftermath!This book chronicles the lasting effects of the dust cloud that surged over Manhattan on 9/11 when the towers came down. The dust was a mixture of mercury vapor from the thousands of florescent tubes, gasses from the improperly burning jet fuel, asbestos, pulverized concrete dust from the structure itself, as well as untold hundreds of other volatile chemicals made from the burning computers, monitors, carpeting, clothing, and bodies that made up the mess at Ground Zero. This Dust permeated buildings, schools, hallways, ductwork, and worked it's way deep into the lungs of those that were there that day, pushing high levels of carcinogenic chemicals and concrete dust deep into their bodies. Those that worked at Ground Zero over the next three months had to deal with slowly burning jet fuel deep underground and the toxic off-gassing that came with it, breathing in even more... Read more
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Extremely thorough, By
This review is from: City of Dust: Illness, Arrogance, and 9/11 (FT Press Science) (Hardcover)
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Fast approaching the tenth anniversary of the World Trade Center attack, Anthony DePalma's "City of Dust" gives the reader an incredibly comprehensive look at the tangled history of the ground zero site through a public health and policy lens. This is probably the most nuanced and measured analysis of the health implications and impacts of the Trade Center dust on the first responders and the New York residents that I have ever read. For anyone with an interest in this issue, you will finish this book feeling extremely informed.That being said, DePalma's book needs a large measure of commitment. Because of all of the different angles he uses to approach the issue and that the reader needs to be informed about, he has used a setup method that involves choosing a representative of a group (for example, the head of the Mt. Sinai medical team) and tracing their actions from 9/11 to about five years or so afterward, to give the reader an understanding of that piece of the... Read more |
Online Sample Chapter
City of Dust: Illness, Arrogance, and 9/11
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments x
About the Author xi
Part I: Catastrophe
Introduction 3
Chapter 1 All That We Hold Dear 9
Chapter 2 Optimism or Arrogance? 27
Chapter 3 Significant Chaos 43
Part II: Disease
Chapter 4 Raising Doubts 65
Chapter 5 A Gathering Storm 81
Chapter 6 Building a Science 99
Chapter 7 It’s Not the Dying 117
Chapter 8 Life and Dust 145
Part III: Doubt
Chapter 9 Such Money Grubbers as These 171
Chapter 10 Degrees of Certitude 191
Chapter 11 Beyond Doubt 209
Chapter 12 Assaulting Uncertainty 239
Chapter 13 Science on Trial 261
Part IV: Reality
Chapter 14 Missed Opportunities 287
Chapter 15 Afterclap 299
Epilogue 317
Index 329
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