num_pages: 288
description: A thrilling drama of man versus naturedetailing the fierce ongoing fight against the mightiest and unlikeliest enemy: rust. It has been called the great destroyer and the evil. The Pentagon refers to it as the pervasive menace. It destroys cars fells bridges sinks ships sparks house fires and nearly brought down the Statue of Liberty. Rust costs America more than $400 billion per yearmore than all other natural disasters combined.In Rust journalist Jonathan Waldman travels from Key West Florida to Prudhoe Bay Alaska to meet the colorful and often reclusive people concerned with corrosion. He sneaks into an abandoned steelworks with a brave artist and nearly gets kicked out of Can School. Across the Arctic he follows a massive high-tech robot hunting for rust in the Alaska pipeline. On a Florida film set he meets the Defense Departments rust ambassador who reveals that the navys number one foe isnt a foreign country but oxidation itself. At Home Depots mothership in Atlanta he hunts unsuccessfully for rust products with the stores rust products buyerand then tracks down some snake-oil salesmen whose potions are not for sale at The Rust Store. Along the way Waldman encounters flying pigs Trekkies decapitations exploding Coke cans rust boogers and nerdy superheroes.The result is a fresh and often funny account of an overlooked engineering endeavor that is as compelling as it is grand illuminating a hidden phenomenon that shapes the modern world. Rust affects everything from the design of our currency to the composition of our tap water and it will determine the legacy we leave on this planet. This exploration of corrosion and the incredible lengths we go to fight it is narrative nonfiction at its very besta fascinating and important subject delivered with energy and wit.
language: English
title: Rust: The Longest War
publisher: Simon & Schuster