WARNING: Disturbing Photo The most iconic and controversial photo from 9/11 is called “Falling Man.” Photographer Richard Drew captured this image at 9:41:15 AM on that horrific day. While the photo appeared all over the newspapers the next day, it has since been “scrubbed” from media websites. Photographer Richard Drew works for the Associated Press. When he was 21, he was standing right behind Robert F. Kennedy when RFK was shot in the head by Sirhan Sirhan; Drew’s jacket, which he saved, was covered in RFK’s blood. On the morning of the attack, Drew was on assignment, taking pictures of a maternity fashion show. A CNN cameraman wearing an earpiece said that a plane had crashed into the North Tower, and Drew's editor rang his cell phone. He packed his equipment into a bag and gambled on taking the subway downtown. Although it was still running, he was the only one on it. He got out at the Chambers Street station and saw that both towers had been turned into smokestacks. Staking out his real estate, he walked west, to where ambulances were gathering, because rescue workers "usually won't throw you out." Then he heard people gasping. People on the ground were gasping because people in the building were jumping. He was standing between a cop and an emergency technician, and each time one of them cried, "There goes another," his camera found a falling body and followed it down for a nine- or twelve-shot sequence. He shot ten or fifteen of them before he heard the rumbling of the South Tower and witnessed its collapse. For more than an hour and a half, the victims streamed from the building, one after another, consecutively rather than en masse, as if each individual required the sight of another individual jumping before mustering the courage to jump himself or herself. One photograph, taken at a distance, shows people jumping in perfect sequence, like parachutists, forming an arc composed of three plummeting people, evenly spaced. There were reports that some tried parachuting, before the force generated by their fall ripped the drapes, the tablecloths, the desperately gathered fabric, from their hands. They were all, obviously, very much alive on their way down, and their way down lasted an approximate count of ten seconds. One hit a fireman on the ground and killed him; the fireman's body was anointed by Father Mychal Judge, whose own death, shortly thereafter, was embraced as an example of martyrdom after the photograph—the redemptive tableau—of firefighters carrying his body from the rubble made its way around the world. Drew was engulfed in a mobile ruin, but he grabbed a mask from an ambulance and photographed the top of the North Tower "exploding like a mushroom" and raining debris. (Subsequent investigation concluded that the Falling Man was likely Norberto Hernandez, pastry chef at Windows On The World). — From an article by Tom Junod published in Esquire Magazine
Karen D.
5d
My oldest son was working 2 buildings away from that on that day. He called me and said everyone was looking out these huge windows and in the background I heard, quite a few times, "there goes another one" while I watched on TV. My son said I gotta go Mom, I am going to try to get out. He hung up. I called my then husband, because that was who my son worked for. I said to him, "do you think he will be ok?" All I heard was him crying. My son actually got the last subway out of Manhattan.
Shaun Leech
5d
I am neither eloquent nor educated to find sufficient and adequate words to describe how this event and photos like this poor man make me feel. I cried on the day this event unfurled and happened. I have been to the site several times since and still get very emotional. Absolutely beyond comprehension the amount of trauma caused and the many lives and families this touched. so very sad.
I am a New Yorker and even had experience working in the upper floors of the WTC, but on that fateful day, I was in LDN viewing the crime, the unfolding tragedy, on my company’s TV in the employee lounge. I felt an unbearable anguish not being in New York alongside citizens who were bearing the brunt of the tragedy. On this day and always, it is de rigeur for us to not forget that there are many in the world who continue to harbor ill will against America and still celebrate 9/11 as something to emulate again if they cld. America has no alternative to remaining on guard, having the strength and intelligence to withstand these enemies. May God bless America!
The photograph, which I have seen before, is always gut wrenching. I was in Pittsburgh on business and scheduled to fly back that very day. We wound up renting a car, with some difficulty, and driving back north east. At the time I was living in Darien, Connecticut. I will never forget going up the New Jersey Turnpike and seeing the smoke and ruins. Our town lost some people and several others were grievously injured.
Dimi Yar
5d
There is no emoji reaction available to properly capture the sentiment. I was there but did not see anyone jumping or on the ground, avoiding the trauma. I walked away perhaps 15-20 minutes before the Towers collapsed. Can't imagine the anguish of those who had no choice but to jump to certain death. Also thinking of the October 7 massacre and every terrorist attack in-between with devastation. There can not be a moral equivalency between the terrorists and their victims, and terrorism can never be justified, no matter the cause. Anyone supporting any terrorist organization should think about having to choose to jump from a skyscaper because there is no other way out, or being kidnapped and stuffed into a tunnel, because someone decided your life must end that day, and not because you wronged someone, but so someone can make some point. Its time for the world to say "never again" and eradicate terrorism.
RAY COLLINS
5d
From Brooklyn saw the second plane hit the south tower watching the north burn....that confirmed what logic had already stated ..we are under attack .. Watched debris spew out from the buildings .. Paper ...fire ...then larger items... Could not tell at first what it all was... Then I realized a desk or a chair doesn't wave and flayl its arms and try to fly .... Truly the most horror one could ever witness.... Two plus decades later still can see it clearly... as clear as that day was bright and sunny..not a cloud in the skies.... Had friends in those buildings some did not ever appear again...literally just dust in the wind.... So However someone wants to speak of this day...have at it ...this can never be forgotten if you saw it with you own eyes and shame on you if you have forgotten just because you were not there... Our brother sisters mothers fathers and friends died that day because we are a nation founded on LIBERTY and we are in the way of sick global totalitarians who want us gone...Period! So if you speak you best be on the side of the Red White & Blue...or move aside because We The People want our Country Back Yippee KIYAY mfers🇺🇸🦅🇺🇸
I'll say this and be done... This post reveals the desperation this man, and numerous others felt in that situation. To add political inferences to it is insulting and uncalled for. This tragedy was the result of evil. Regardless what your political preferences are, people lost their lives. Can we just shelve the assanine political rhetoric and reflect on the loss of the day and this tragic anniversary?
I was back in Glasgow from overseas, I’d went down to my local for a coffee and to read the paper, when it first came on TV I thought it was a trailer for an new blockbuster….little was I to know as the story unfolded live, I went home and spent the rest of the day watching updates, the attacks on that day murdered 2,996 innocent people, not killed….murdered. Never Forget 9/11 🙏🫶
I remember that day as if it were yesterday. I was in between jobs and a older friend from church had employed me on his dairy farm to help our family out during this difficult time. I was on a tractor and bush hog in one of the back fields when he and another farm hand came driving across the field in a hurry. When they reached me they tried to explain what was happening. The old farm truck had an AM radio in it and I got it to work. We stood there in the middle of nowhere listening to what seemed like our worst fears were coming true. America was being attacked! As a Navy veteran, I can realize what it felt like on December 7th, 1941. This was and will continue to be point in time on my life’s dateline.
Real Estate Sales-Homes-Land-Investment Properties
5dWhy has the photo been scrubbed?