Photographers Blog

Seaside Heights, New Jersey

By Steve Nesius

Hurricane Sandy hit the coast of New Jersey on a Monday. I shot many photos over the next week, but one image stands out. I saw the Seaside Heights roller coaster in the ocean during a helicopter ride. It was an odd scene, but only one small moment in miles of damage I photographed from the air. The following day, I photographed the roller coaster from beach level. I’ve since received calls and emails from strangers who have seen the published photo telling me how much the roller coaster was a part of their lives and why that scene is an iconic image of the damage to the Jersey shore. It’s a very surreal image to me as well, and not one I’ll soon forget.

I’ve lived by the ocean or Gulf most of my adult life, experiencing many hurricanes, always facing the dilemma of evacuating or riding it out. Fortunately, I’ve never dealt with the damage I saw from Sandy on the New Jersey coast. My heart goes out to all those affected by this super storm. I’m already back home but this story is far from over. Our colleagues continue to take incredible images and report compelling stories in communities still coping weeks after Sandy made landfall.

I began to pay closer attention to the track of Hurricane Sandy as it moved through the Bahamas. Storm surf was already pounding south Florida. My upcoming weekend assignment was to photograph the effects of Sandy along the Florida coast from Daytona Beach northward on Friday, then cover the Florida Georgia NCAA football game Saturday in Jacksonville.

My travel plans soon evolved. On Thursday afternoon, Mike Christie, Miami-based General Manager, asked me to rent a van, load it with logistics support supplies we maintain at a storage unit in Florida and be on stand-by during my weekend assignment.

I made several images of people Friday morning on the Ponce Inlet jetty getting sprayed by huge storm surf and blasted by blowing sand. That evening, Sandy became a “super storm.” My new plans were to continue northward to position myself where I could provide logistical support and photograph the storm aftermath.

Staten Island, New York

By Mike Segar

As New York braced for the arrival of Hurricane Sandy three weeks ago, I was in California for a long-planned personal event. But I wasn’t about to miss what was shaping up to be a major story. I was determined to get back. I found a united flight to Detroit, Michigan, that was still listed as “on-time.” How far a drive would that be to New York? 10 hours? Through a hurricane?… I’ll take it, I thought. Seven hours later I was on the ground in Michigan driving through the night towards New York as winds howled and Sandy was coming ashore. I made it back to a region knocked to its knees by this storm.

The next seven days were a blur of finding and photographing those worst hit by the storm and hunting for gas for vehicles to keep going (not to mention returning home to a house without power, heat or hot water and without my wife and children who had evacuated to Massachusetts). Together Reuters photographers Lucas Jackson, Shannon Stapleton, Brendan McDermid, Keith Bedford, Adrees Latif, Andrew Kelly, Tom Mihalek, Carlo Alegri, Steve Nesius, Chip East, Adam Hunger and myself covered the immediate aftermath of Sandy in countless locations. We documented places and people affected by this massive natural disaster, one of the most destructive ever to hit the Northeast U.S. Our team made amazing pictures throughout and our collective photographic documentation of this disaster speaks for itself.

GALLERY: A STORM NAMED SANDY

I found myself mostly covering the particularly hard hit borough of Staten Island where at least 23 people died. Many Staten Islanders say they live in New York City’s “forgotten borough.” On Staten Island’s south shore there are several long low-lying communities of mostly working class New Yorkers, many with civil service jobs. With a mixture of ethnic backgrounds of long-time residents and recent immigrants, this area consists of mostly beach bungalow style homes. The homes are mostly single story and packed closely together near the shore that stretches for about six miles and faces the Atlantic Ocean.

Hoboken, New Jersey

By Gary Hershorn

For thirty-four years I have been a photojournalist covering events the world over, but never have I had to live within a news event in my hometown. Too many times to count in my 28 years with Reuters, I have packed my bags and flown off to cover the news but never have I looked out my window and seen a story unfold before me. It is an indescribable feeling watching waters rage and rise in the street below, feeling as helpless as one can be.

Saturday:

It was a perfectly normal day in Hoboken, New Jersey. I was out and about knowing that forecasters were calling for Hurricane Sandy to come ashore somewhere between Cape May and New York late Monday night. By mid-afternoon I walked to a pier that juts out into the Hudson River to see if I could get some pictures of Lower Manhattan with gray clouds looming in the sky. I was fortunate to have some newlyweds walk out to the pier to have their wedding pictures taken using the New York skyline as a backdrop. The contrast of the white dress and the dark gray skies made for a nice photograph.

The only thing out of the normal was making sure I had the supplies one is supposed to have if a storm of this size hits. However, my biggest concern was if I was going to get wet covering Monday’s NFL game between the New York Jets and Miami Dolphins.