World Disasters

At 01:23:40 on April 26th 1986, Alexander Akimov pressed the emergency shutdown button at Chernobyl's fourth nuclear reactor. It was an act that forced the permanent evacuation of a city, killed thousands, and crippled the Soviet Union. The event spawned decades of conflicting, exaggerated, and inaccurate stories.

It had been 12 months since the worst day in Russell’s life. The anniversary of his daughter’s death sent him into the bottle. He loved his wife, but they grieved in different ways. Would the pain ever stop? Sarah missed Russell. She lay in bed unable to sleep. The heartache had nearly broken her, too, but Sarah didn’t want their marriage to end. If she could just get him to stop drinking. Could they learn to live again?

Pompeii was a lively resort flourishing in the shadow of Mount Vesuvius at the height of the Roman Empire. When Vesuvius erupted in an explosion of flame and ash, the entire town would be destroyed. Some of its citizens died in the chaos, some escaped the mountain’s wrath . . . and these are their stories. Six authors bring to life overlapping stories of patricians and slaves, warriors and politicians, villains and heroes who cross each other’s paths during Pompeii’s fiery end. But who will escape, and who will be buried for eternity?

A gripping and wholly original account of the epic human tragedy that was the great Klondike Gold Rush of 1897-98. One hundred thousand men and women rushed heedlessly north to make their fortunes; very few did, but many thousands of them died in the attempt. The unvarnished tale of this mass migration is always striking, revealing the amazing truth of what people will do for a chance to be rich.

2 Bonus Books Included: Survival Fallout Shelter & Survival Bug Out Bag WARNING! This is a hands-on, practical survival guide that will teach you everything you need to know to survive anything, anywhere. Read this ebook on your PC, Mac, smartphone, tablet, or Kindle device. The truth is that survival is not always as easy as relying on ready-made shelter and store-bought food. In fact, anyone who watches the news, or otherwise pays attention to what is going on in the world, can quickly come to the conclusion that sometimes, survival requires specific skills. You may face having to know ...

The gripping story of a chemical weapons catastrophe, the cover-up, and how one American Army doctor’s discovery led to the development of the first drug to combat cancer, known today as chemotherapy.

It’s 1942, and London remains under constant threat of enemy attack as the second world war rages on. In the Bethnal Green neighborhood, Nellie Morris counts every day lucky that she emerges from the underground shelters unharmed, her loving family still surrounding her. Three years into the war, she’s grateful to hold onto remnants of normalcy—her job as assisting the mayor and nights spent at the local pub with her best friend. But after a chance encounter with Ray, an American airman stationed nearby, Nellie becomes enchanted with the idea of a broader world.

During the height of the blizzard of 1978, the tanker Global Hope floundered on the shoals off the Massachusetts coast. The Coast Guard dispatched a patrol boat, but was soon in as much trouble as the tanker. Then pilot boat captain Frank Quirk, hearing of the Coast Guard's troubles on his radio, decided to act.

When an EMP wipes out the power grid, the world goes dark and law and order vanish overnight. With no food, no water, and no government response, Emily Fairfield must fight to protect her children. Her daughter is trapped in a crumbling city, her son caught in the chaos, and danger is closing in from all sides. Alongside a wounded paramedic and the daughter of a mob boss, Emily risks everything to reunite her family. In a world without rules, survival will come at a cost.

When an EMP collapses society…rabid packs of ex-convicts and gangs ravage an off-grid Texas……turning Houston into hunting grounds. Double-crossed and incarcerated for armed robbery, Alex longs for a second chance. And revenge. Then the EMP downs the Texas grid, providing Alex an opportunity. Despite the buildings aflame, bullets flying, and absolute barbaric conditions, Alex seizes the chance to track down the traitor who crossed him and find Wendy—his daughter.

We think we know the story of the Titanic—the once majestic and supposedly unsinkable ship that struck an iceberg on its maiden voyage from Britain to America—but very little has been written about the vessel’s 705 survivors. How did the events of that horrific night in the icy waters of the North Atlantic affect the lives of those who lived to tell the tale? Drawing on a wealth of previously unpublished letters, memoirs, diaries, and interviews with their family members, award-winning journalist Andrew Wilson brings to life the survivors’ colorful voices.

The first book in a now complete series. Thirty-five years after the world ended, a lonely man picks his way across the ashes of America on a final mission. Reuben Bane spent decades believing he was a force for good, preserving humanity's gene pool by hunting and eliminating deviants. Now, he seeks redemption for his evil deeds, and revenge on the cultish Foundation. He must travel across a broken country to find a woman from the past who holds the key to the future. After the End is the first book in a new series by Kevin Partner, veteran of the post apocalyptic science fiction genre. Set...

Don and Samantha’s community has survived the long harsh Michigan winter and made it to the April showers bring May flowers stage. They’re ready to get their gardens in and build their food stores up, so the next winter won’t be so hard on them.

For years man has explored the universe looking for lost galaxies and watching the planets and constellations that we knew existed. Also, throughout the centuries and in recent years, meteorites from beyond our solar system have made their way toward our planet, entered our atmosphere and impacted the earth. Scientists are continually on the lookout for such objects heading our way although most either veer past the earth, or when they do reach the earth, cause little notice and minor damage from their impact. What would happen if an asteroid reached the earth that was big enough to wipe ...

So Others May Live: Coast Guard Rescue Swimmers: Saving Lives, Defying Death is the award-winning untold story of the US Coast Guard's quiet but resolute rescue swimmers. From deep ocean caves on the Oregon coast to the panicked and chaotic streets of post-Katrina New Orleans, here are their stunningly heroic stories.

Chris Mooney, author of The Republican War on Science and one of the leading young environmental journalists and bloggers working today, immerses listeners in the world of those who study hurricanes. What was once an arcane branch of meteorology (itself an arcane science) has become embroiled in one of the most politicized and hotly contested debates in American science: whether or not the recent hurricane disasters, culminating in Katrina, are connected to global warming.

In the rubble of Hurricane Maria, Puerto Ricans and ultrarich "Puertopians" are locked in a pitched struggle over how to remake the island. In this vital and startling investigation, The New York Times best-selling author and activist Naomi Klein uncovers how the forces of shock politics and disaster capitalism seek to undermine the nation's radical, resilient vision for a just recovery.

Haiti’s state is near-collapse: armed groups have overrun the country, many government officials have fled after the 2021 assassination of President Moise, refugees desperately set out on boats to reach the US and Latin America, and the economy reels from the after-effects of disasters that destroyed much of Haiti’s infrastructure. How did a nation founded on liberation come to such a precipice? Jake Johnston, researcher and writer at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, reveals how US and European capitalist goals re-enslaved Haiti under the guise of helping it.

Sailing across the Pacific, the battle-scarred heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis had just delivered a secret cargo that would trigger the end of World War II. Heading westward, she was sunk by a Japanese submarine. In 12 minutes, some 300 men went down with her. More than 900 other spent four horrific days and five nights in the ocean with no water to drink, savaged by a pitiless sun and swarms of sharks. Incredibly, no one knew they were there until a navy patrol plane accidentally discovered them. In the end, only 316 crewmen survived. How could this have happened - and why?

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.