American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center [Hardcover]

William Langewiesche (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 24, 2002

The unsung-and revealing-story of the Herculean effort to finish the dismantling that terrorism began

Unlike any other reporter, William Langewiesche has had unrestricted access to Ground Zero and the people involved in the cleanup. He has literally followed in the footsteps of engineers, "deconstruction" workers, firemen, and city officials as they tackle the mind-numbing task of bringing order to an instance of chaos unprecedented on our soil.

American Ground is a tour of the interlocking circles of this Dantesque world. With the "knowledge and passion as well as ...careful eloquence" for which his reportage is known (New York Times Book Review), Langewiesche anatomizes the physical details of the collapse and deconstruction, capturing in the process the contest of politics and personality that were its aftershock. At the center of the book is the team of engineers, many of them instrumental in building the towers, who now must collaborate in the sad task of disassembling them. Their responses are as dramatic and unpredictable as the shifting pile of rubble and the surrounding "slurry wall" that constantly threatens to collapse, potentially flooding a large part of underground Manhattan. They are also emotional and territorial, as firemen, police, widows, and officials attempt to claim the tragedy-and the difficult work of extracting the rubble and the thousands of dead buried there-as their own.

In all of these aspects-its vociferousness, spontaneity, ingenuity, and fundamental democracy-Langewiesche reveals the story of the deconstruction to be uniquely American, and harshly inspiring. He has constructed an account that will endure against the events of September 11, 2001 as John Hersey's Hiroshima stands in relation to August 1945.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Langewiesche had unrestricted access to Manhattan's Ground Zero during the post-September 11 cleanup, and his triptych of articles (originally published in the Atlantic Monthly) takes readers through what became known to its denizens as the Pile, from the moment of destruction to the departure of the last truckload of rubble from the ruins a little less than nine months later. He gives a calm, precise account of the air traffic controllers trying to understand what was happening to the hijacked planes and explains precisely how the towers collapsed. The stars of the rest of this story are people one doesn't usually read about: administrators, engineers and construction workers in charge of the cleanup-a process in which, as Langewiesche describes it, order emerged from chaos by the sheer force of will of those in charge. One such outsize personality is David Griffin, a demolition expert who drove up from North Carolina, bluffed his way onto the restricted site, and quickly wound up in a position of authority. There's also a frank account of the tensions between police and firefighters at Ground Zero. Most fascinating, though, Langewiesche takes readers right inside the smoking Pile, as he joins workers on dangerous underground expeditions to see whether the slurry walls that keep out the Hudson will hold, or whether freon might be leaking from underground refrigerators. This is a genuinely monumental story, told without melodrama, an intimate depiction of ordinary Americans reacting to grand-scale tragedy at their best-and sometimes their worst.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"The most thoughtful and original [9-11] book to appear so far is American Ground, William Langewiesche's meticulous description of the rescue effort at Ground Zero and the subsequent excavation of the 1.8 million tons of debris at the literal and emotional heart of this calamity. Langewiesche was granted almost unlimited access to the site and the rescue staff, and he made the most of the privilege."
-Malcolm Jones, Newsweek

"This is a genuinely monumental story, told without melodrama, an intimate depiction of ordinary Americans reacting to grand-scale tragedy."
-Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"An extraordinary story . . . Langewiesche . . . was the only reporter granted total access to Ground Zero . . . He spent nine months there and emerged to write American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center . . . It is an amazing piece of journalism, full of colorful characters and astonishing scenes."
-The Washington Post

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: North Point Press; 1st edition (October 24, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0865475822
• ISBN-13: 978-0865475823
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (50 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #912,957 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

54 of 68 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating insights October 4, 2002

By stackofbooks

Format:Hardcover

Langewiesche's book is a result of brilliant reporting and essentially tells us, as the title says, how the debris from the 9-11 tragedy was dealt with. He describes with clarity the utter chaos at the site and the noisy democracy that prevailed and that allowed a small organization called the DDC (Department of Design and Construction) to direct recovery efforts. He also details the personality clashes between the different factions at the site-an inevitable result of working under extreme, trying conditions.

Langewiesche's descriptions of the ruins (along with the wonderful pictures) are chilling: "Most of the rooms (of the Deutsche Bank dining area) had been unoccupied at the time of the attack, and were set for lunch-with fresh place mats, plates, and utensils, and sets of stemmed glasses, some of which had been capsized and broken by the pressure waves and lay now as they had fallen, like everything else here, under a feathery gauze of the Twin Towers' remains." His account of the last minutes of American Airlines Flight 11 and its last conversations with an air-traffic controller in Boston Center are eerie and scary.

The book describes the recovery effort and all the personalities who made it happen, wonderfully. I found myself admiring the soft-spoken demolition expert from North Carolina, David Griffin who, true to the American method, just showed up at the site, proved his merit, and got the job.

I was comforted in a strange sort of way to read that most of the steel recovered from the WTC site was sold as scrap and trucked away to countries such as China, who would put the steel to good use and recycle it. As Langewiesche puts it, "It was a strangely appropriate fate for these buildings, named for just this sort of trade."

In the end, 1.5 million tons of debris was hauled away from the World Trade Center site. The scale alone is daunting enough. That the recovery effort was carried out efficiently and with respect for the dead, is a triumph in an otherwise trying time. Langewiesche's book pays well-deserved homage to the people and the institutions that made it happen.

17 of 20 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Controversial View of the Fire Department December 23, 2002

By John G. Hilliard

Format:Hardcover

What an interesting book this turned out to be. The author takes the reader through the rescue, recovery and clean up effort at the World Trade Center after the 9-11 attacks. I tend to like a book with a lot of facts and that is exactly what this book delivered. Interesting tid bits that an account based only on the attack or rescue just would not cover. He goes in depth into all aspects of the clean up from how the material was taken off the pile, transport to a landfill, and the sorting of the material at the landfill. The review of the management of the process was also well written. It takes a good author to make some of these mundane issues exciting and this author did it.

I think the most unexpected part of the book for me was the hard look he took at the actions of the firefighters during the clean up. It was not flattering and for the most part the negative items he reports are not very well known. As you read other reviews this particular item appears to elicit the most emotion. Overall this was a very interesting book. The detail was there and it was well written. My only complaint would be that it was only 200 pages - I would have liked even more detail.

26 of 32 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars All sides of the tradegy revealed...know them all. November 27, 2002

By A Customer

Format:Hardcover

William Langewiesche's account of the clean-up after 9-11 may be one of the finest pieces of non-fiction i've ever read. Prior to this book, I was aware of the high quality of his writing. After reading his revealing and very human, and humane, account of the clean-up I'd say that his clarity admist a stunning array of chaos and sorrow is profound. I don't agree with the protests against this book. His criticisms of the firefighters, and others as well, are a very small part of the book and he points a fair and critical eye at all involved. His publisher and the Atlantic Monthly have been adamant that the fact checking in this book is of the highest level. I'm inclined to believe them. But the larger point is that this is book is also an incredible testament to the incredible efforts the rescue and clean-up personnel demonstrated at Ground Zero, or as they called it, "the Pile." His analysis of the defacto organization that sprung up from nowhere, and without anyone's actual approval, to run and lead the cleanup efforts is fascinating. The "on the fly" ingenuity that many of the engineers, construction workers and other onsite personnel display is in a word...inspiring. Please don't turn your back on this book because it doesn't paint everyone in the best light. The best reporting often doesn't. It's real, heartwrenching, brutally honest, celebratory and epic. William Langewiesche should be lauded for cataloging the best, and the worst, of our human nature and as American citizens.