The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes - and Why

Best Book I've Ever Read

This book WILL save your life. It is by far the best and most intriguing book I have ever read. People believe they know how they would react in an emergency situation. HA! After this book, you will mentally practice what you will do in case of a disaster, and therefore, SAVE YOUR LIFE. Everyone on the planet should read this book. It's fantastic. I just bought a second copy to mail to my brother.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

The Unthinkable

It truly is a must read for everyone, so that people can understand and practice what they would do if disaster happens to them. It explains various responses to disaster situations, and why they occur. It explained my own behavior in certain stressful times, that I couldn't understand at the time they happened. It is very timely, including 911 and the Virginia Tech massacre as examples. PLEASE READ!!

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

good read

This is the better of the psychology survival books.

Unthinkable is Unthinkable

Worth your time reading this fantastic book..............you will not be sorry.

Would like to buy a copy for everyone I love

I would love to make this required reading before you can graduate from high school.

Well-researched and mandatory reading for anyone who has been in a potentially dangerous crisis situation (fires, plane crashes, panicked crowds, etc.) and for anyone who wants to know how to stay alive during one.

I heard Amanda Ripley on NPR and, having evacuated from a building as a child during a fire in which five people died and, of course, watching the horror of people jumping off the WTC on 9/11, I was motivated to get the book.

Ripley covers both WTC bombings from the point of view of an employee who survived both; a terrible fire in a private club in a young waiter saved many people, but in which many people died; a pilgrimage to the Hajj, which has several times been the scene of crowd-related deaths; and a plane which crashed into the Potomac River. She weaves these personal stories around past conventional thinking about crowd control and new research about how people actually behave, with clear instructions on how to change that behavior to stay alive. Case in point: More often than not, when people are aware that a fire has broken out, rather than immediately evacuate, they linger to pick up personal items, thinking they have some time, when in fact, seconds count. This seems obvious, but in a crisis, we tend to react the opposite way we should.

In the case of the Hajj pilgrimages, the stampedes were finally averted by better time and crowd management, but for the longest time, those in charge wrote off the deaths as "God's will" in spite of one man (a non-Muslim) who studied the Hajj crowd issue and repeatedly brought solutions to their attention.

Even for those haven't been in similar situations, it's worth reading, just to have the information stored in the back of the brain, because you may need that info in the future.

Unthinkable

A double purpose book. I bought 3 more copies to give to my adult children. Useful advice not only for possible disaster scenarios but
also a clearer understanding of how the human brain works and how to
short circuit possible dangerous "freezing" or denial time and shorten your reaction time. Applicable to better and more effective decision making in daily life also.

bedside book

Its a great interesting topic, fun and easy to read.

Insightful Research Combined with Impactful Human Stories

Ripley has taken the tragic human stories of recent disasters out of the headline news and put them into a framework that combines detailed research with useful strategies for survival. I found it impactful on both a business as well as a day to day living basis. Loved it!

Great book for anyone in the Disaster Biz...

As a professional disaster planner, I found this to be a great book. It includes first hand accounts of actions taken during emergencies, then explains how and why those actions have come about through our evolution. She talks with responders, psychologists, neurologists and every day folks and makes it all readable and interesting.

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