Five years without Justin
By Jason Reed and Larry Downing
America’s military commitment in Afghanistan has been long by any count. Ten years of bloody war fathered by an angry country seeking revenge after it was blindsided in deadly attacks on September 11, 2001. Innocent souls vanished forever inside the flames that day in New York, Washington D.C. and Pennsylvania.
Since then thousands of combat GI’s from willing countries have answered their nation’s call to hunt down those thought responsible for that day who are still hiding along the dark footpaths snaking the dangerous countryside.
Every time a soldier, or Marine dies in combat, he, or she is quickly flown home to be buried by a grieving family.
Mother’s shattered hearts and fresh tears point the way to their own child’s gravesite; they soon discover they’ve passed the initiation into a painful sorority bound forever by the death of a child killed during war. A reluctant sisterhood living with sad stories and broken memories called “Gold Star Mothers.”
Paula Davis lost her 19 year-old son, Justin, while he fought in Afghanistan in 2006. He had vowed to his mom he’d never forget his childhood memories of September 11th and enlisted in the U.S. Army one week after graduating from high school.
A daughter’s last goodbye
Six-year-old Wakana Kumagai began to run from the car when she arrived at a temporary mass grave site in Higashi-Matsushima, Miyagi prefecture.
She had come to meet her father.
On that day Wakana attended an entrance ceremony for her elementary school. Afterward she went with her mother and older brother to the grave site. She showed off her dress and bright red school satchel as she described the entrance ceremony to her father. But her father, Kazuyuki, slept in the soil.
He was only 31 when he died.
An outsider’s view inside Tucson
Arriving at the scene of the Tucson shooting, I really didn’t know what to expect. There is always a nervous energy driven by adrenalin. You know you have to be there. You know it’s going to be bad, but you know you have to be there. Someone has to tell the story. Someone has to show it to the rest of the world.
The first couple of days were spent in shock. The whole community was in shock. How could this happen here? Details that will later emerge are largely hidden at this point. The why and the how – that’s for later stories. Right now, the pressing issue is to document this. Right now is the time to photograph what the community and its people are going through. No time to think, no time to react, I need to do my job and show this for what it is right now. It’s still chaos. You try to make order from the chaos. Later the images will have context. Later you can place them into a framework, but for the moment it’s all reaction. Cover that one piece, then move on. Those fragments will all make sense later on, but for now just keep moving.
I’m an outsider, but the community has embraced their responsibility in the wake of the tragedy. There was a reaction, and then they came together. The people had opened themselves up. They let me in and let me photograph them during a horrible time in their city’s history. I didn’t experience any negativity in covering anything related to the shooting. In fact, the only time I felt unwanted was when I photographed the gun show. They did not want me there. They did not want photos made.
It’s to be expected, as this is a sensitive time here.
I was an outsider coming in to cover this tragedy, but having been there from nearly the beginning, I felt like I was a part of this. I saw it from every side while very close to the actual event. I was there fast enough to still see people involved in the shooting at the scene. I was there for the first vigils, for the first candles and pictures. I was there and saw the memorials grow. I was there before much of the media arrived, and I was there after most of them left. I’m not a resident of this place, but somehow I feel a connection to the event; an empathy for the people who were not only involved or personally affected, but for the community as well.
A town of grief
The coffins of six British soldiers killed in Afghanistan are driven though the streets of Wootton Bassett in southwest England November 10, 2009. REUTERS/Suzanne Plunkett
Since the early 2000′s, the bodies of fallen servicemen and women from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and other places have been repatriated to RAF Lyneham. They pass through the town of Wootton Bassett on their way to the coroner in Oxford. This has led to family members, friends, locals and mourners from further afield assembling along the route of the funeral cortege. It is an emotionally charged event that garners wide media coverage every time.
A man cries as the hearses carrying the coffins of five British soldiers are driven through the streets of Wootton Bassett, southern England March 11, 2010. REUTERS/Kieran Doherty
This was the second time that I had covered this story, the first being just a few weeks ago. Then again yesterday as five servicemen were repatriated. Standing on stepladders to facilitate a clear view over the hearses sounds conspicuous at such an event. And it is. There is no getting away from it. In order to document what is happening, we need to be able to see it.
Mourners react as coffins are driven though the streets of Wootton Bassett. REUTERS/Andrew Winning (L) and (C) Stephen Hird (R)
I noticed yesterday that photographers kept shutter bursts to a minimum. This isn’t some High Court snatch picture opportunity. This is a story that requires grief to be documented as sensitively and delicately as possible, as I am sure every photographer working in Wootton Bassett yesterday, as on every previous occasion, was touched in some way by the sadness caused from the loss of loved ones.
A mourner holds a white rose as hearses carrying the coffins of two British soldiers are driven through the streets of Wootton Bassett in southern England February 5, 2010. REUTERS/Toby Melville
Choking back the horror
Five years have passed and I still find it hard to talk about the tsunami. When the subject comes up my throat still constricts, choking back the horror and raw pain that I saw and more shockingly, the way the rest of the world seemed to carry-on with daily life. Relief came – sometimes too much of it, but nothing prepares a photographer for the shock of returning to normality from a disaster zone.
I was in Phuket the day before Christmas, dodging the bullet perhaps as my ground floor room would certainly have become my tomb. Back in Singapore the news broke and I flew to Sri Lanka, arriving at the center of the destruction 24 hours after the waves. My first stop was a hospital outside Galle. Hundreds of bodies lay on the damp concrete floor, children in fetal positions next to what rescuers assumed were their parents. Some of them had bandages and IV’s telling the story of the pathetic struggle to save them, others just looked like they were asleep, still in pajamas but slowly bloating.
Blood and bodily fluid and the stark stench of decomposition. I worked the scene like a vulture, the lenses my shield; my shock at the scene my helmet; technical adjustments on the cameras my distraction from the horror. I edited on the fly, transmitting a few images via satphone and moving onto more death. It is only that night as I look through my day’s take that the tears come, as the reality of what I saw hits me – there is no lens now. Only the hard truth in 2 megabyte files on a dusty laptop screen.
The destruction was complete – nothing within a few hundred yards of the beach was untouched. As we drove into Galle, a few miles out of town, life was normal. Schoolgirls walked to school, mothers hung laundry outside modest homes and markets were open. The sheer contrast from the normal Sri Lanka I love and the damage was instantaneous and merciless. We moved north, meeting a diving buddy who had lost his dive school and all his staff; some Swedish friends who had lost their hotel and thousands more bodies. The Sri Lankans were stoic, burying the dead methodically, guarding their emotions – numb with shock.
Further north we entered a community of Muslims that has been completely flattened. Muslims buried Hindus, Christians and Buddhists – praying for them, hoping their onward journey was complete wherever they go. A stern-faced army general arrived to assess the damage and the security situation. The bodies were extracted from huge piles of concrete by hand and the mass graves were in shallow beach sand. “They are all Muslims now” said one of the grave diggers.
In Batticaloa we hitched a ride on a Sri Lankan army helicopter – unsure of its destination. My seat had no seatbelt and the old Huey had no doors. I hung on for my life while trying to shoot. Below us the land was flooded by heavy rains, adding insult to injury and a new toll of casualties. We landed at Ampara Air Force base and spent the day going up in helicopters, yelling passport details to the ground controller before each flight in case we went down. We delivered body bags, water and rations to several small villages. The Indian Air Force arrived in big Hinds helicopters to help the relief effort. It all seemed futile.
Tom, I am at awe at reading your article. Your observations are descriptive as well as poetic. I too want to thank-you for putting yourself in harms way. Thanks and prayers for your safety. Your stories will impact the world.
Aftermath of a quake: Audio slideshow
A showcase of David’s Gray images of the aftermath of the Sichuan earthquake are set to music in this audio slideshow.
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The Wall
This is awesome ma!! RIP my brother Justin! You are truly missed!