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I teach anthropology and environmental studies at Haveford College, just outside of Philly. Currently, I'm holed up in a cabin in the Adirondacks in upstate New York with several family members, including my spouse and 4 year old daughter and 3 dogs. I started working on disasters by accident, when one day in 2001 I was walking to class at NYU and saw the World Trade Center buildings on flames. I have known Kim for a few year and I contacted her to connect with folks around Covid-19 and its imacts.

I'm particularly intersted in issues of communal grief, mourning, and bereavement. Also, I'm interested in the religious response to Covid-19.

The film addresses the general public, as it does not include significant amounts of scientific information that would require prior knowledge. The nature of the film however does aim toward a mature audience, as the film advises viewer discretion due to graphic images.

I looked into the aid organization Medicins Sans Frontieres and the incident mentioned in the article where the organization was forced to abandon their operations in Somalia.  The multiple mentions of a lack of data available on violence against aid workers led me to research the Aid Worker Security Database in order to better understand the system for which data was organized. Finally, I was surprised by the mention of government supported violence against aid workers and decided to look into that. There was a significant amount of news concerning government plots and political violence but very little appeared to be reliable or could be corroborated.

Research for this article comprised of interviews and recorded statements of dozens of police and fire personnel present at the towers and other officials who were tasked with investigating the response.

The development of Twine was funded primarily through donations from individual investors interested in the data sharing aspects of the software and humanitarian aid organizations who benefit from the accessible data.

The article has been referenced in several other published works that look at hurricane Katrina and the long term effects, including Aging Disaster: Mortality, Vulnerability, and Long-Term Recovery Among Katrina Survivors, on which Vincanne Adams and Taslim van Hattum both worked.