Scan barcode
A review by cheryl6of8
Dead Center: Behind the Scenes at the World's Largest Medical Examiner's Office by Shiya Ribowsky
4.0
A fascinating look at the work of a Medico-Legal Investigator for the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in NYC. I only meant to peek at it for a second and ended up reading the whole thing in an afternoon. The running of the morgue and the work with doctors and hospitals and police and families was very fascinating. (Interestingly, the medical advisor at my job has made statements agreeing with the author that most doctors do not have the foggies idea how to fill out a death certificate and that no one should take one at face value unless issued after an autopsy.)
Most interesting and compelling and heartbreaking was the discussion of the aftermath of 9/11. The author was at that time in charge of handling the identification of the dead, which turned into a gargantuan task after 9/11 given the state of the remains recovered. He provided an absolutely fascinating look at the organization and management of the system he had to devise on the spot and at the things that went wrong (surprisingly few) and the things that were learned from the horror of it all. I learned quite a few things from this book that were never discussed in the news coverage -- the hard feelings that exist between the NYPD and FDNY and the families over the 2 classifications of victims and the disparate treatment, the length of time the fire continued to burn and the details of deaths, the fact that remains of four of the hijackers were found and identified but no death certificate has ever been issued, and the sheer outpouring of appreciation that the OCME team received doing their difficult work.
Altogether a great read and one that will likely stick with me for a while.
Most interesting and compelling and heartbreaking was the discussion of the aftermath of 9/11. The author was at that time in charge of handling the identification of the dead, which turned into a gargantuan task after 9/11 given the state of the remains recovered. He provided an absolutely fascinating look at the organization and management of the system he had to devise on the spot and at the things that went wrong (surprisingly few) and the things that were learned from the horror of it all. I learned quite a few things from this book that were never discussed in the news coverage -- the hard feelings that exist between the NYPD and FDNY and the families over the 2 classifications of victims and the disparate treatment, the length of time the fire continued to burn and the details of deaths, the fact that remains of four of the hijackers were found and identified but no death certificate has ever been issued, and the sheer outpouring of appreciation that the OCME team received doing their difficult work.
Altogether a great read and one that will likely stick with me for a while.