Rower transformed by work at Ground Zero

0 Comments | USA TODAY, July, 2004 | by Jill Lieber

During his darkest moments, in the weeks and months following the 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, Jason Read wondered why he had even bothered getting up in the mornings.

An eight-time member of the U.S. national rowing team and chief of the Amwell Valley Rescue Squad in Ringoes, N.J., an hour or so from Manhattan, Read had helped coordinate efforts at Ground Zero. After five difficult days, he could not make sense of his life, much less his quest to compete in the Athens Olympics.

"I had a sense of apathy about all things in the world that had meant so much to me," he says. "Did I want to row anymore? Did I want to be chief of a volunteer rescue squad? What did it mean? All those people had been killed. Game over. Mortality became reality in a...