An award-winning photojournalist known for his incredible work in war zones died today in the Libyan city of Misrata, according to two of the organizations he worked for.
Tim Hetherington was killed when a mortar struck near where he was working, Vanity Fair and Panos Pictures (via CNN) say.
Hetherington, from the U.K., last year co-directed the acclaimed, Oscar-nominated film Restrepo, which documented the lives of a platoon of American soldiers serving at a remote outpost in Afghanistan. A contributing photographer for Vanity Fair, his biography says that Hetherington's interests lie "in creating diverse forms of visual communication and his work has ranged from multi-screen installations, to fly-poster exhibitions, to handheld device downloads." He turned 41 this year.
Photojournalist Tim Hetherington, at the 83rd Annual Academy Awards - Nominated Docs! Reception on February 23, 2011 in Beverly Hills, Calif. His film Restrepo was nominated for a Best Documentary Feature.
Photojournalist Tim Hetherington, at the 83rd Annual Academy Awards - Nominated Docs! Reception on February 23, 2011 in Beverly Hills, Calif. His film Restrepo was nominated for a Best Documentary Feature.
Hetherington's most recent NPR appearance was on Talk of the Nation in February. He and Restrepo co-director Sebastian Junger discussed that film. As he told All Things Considered last June, he broke his leg while out on a patrol the U.S. solders were conducting. The platoon had to get off a mountainside before dawn, and Hetherington had to walk despite the injury.
Other journalists were also hit in the incident today in Misrata. And there have been multiple reports via Twitter and other outlets that another may have died.
Among those at the scene was Chris Hondros, a 41-year-old American, who "has covered most of the world's major conflicts since the late 1990s, including wars in Kosovo, Angola, Sierra Leone, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Kashmir, the West Bank, Iraq, and Liberia," his biography reads. "His work has appeared on the covers of magazines such as Newsweek and The Economist, and on the front pages of most major American newspapers, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times."
In March 2007, Hondros talked with with Morning Edition about one memorable image he took in Iraq: a little girl, covered in the blood of her dead parents. "We share a huge visual memory bank, mostly through painting and other images in history," he said. "I think when a modern photograph taps into those, sometimes very subliminally, it makes people respond." There's a gripping audio slideshow with that Morning Edition report.
Photojournalist Chris Hondros poses with a a former Liberian government soldier in Monrovia, Liberia, in 2005.
Photojournalist Chris Hondros poses with a a former Liberian government soldier in Monrovia, Liberia, in 2005.
Update at 3:25 p.m. ET. More Details And Word About The Others.
The Washington Post reports that one of its photographers, Leila Fadel, happened to be at the hospital where the injured were taken. The Post says that according to Fadel:
"Hetherington appeared to be bleeding heavily from his leg and was very pale, she said. About 15 minutes after his arrival, doctors in the tent pronounced him dead, she said. ...
"About 10 minutes later, another ambulance brought Hondros and other photographers to the hospital. Hondros had suffered a severe head injury. ... Two other photographers, Guy Martin, a British citizen, and Michael Christopher Brown, also suffered shrapnel wounds, but the severity of their injuries was unclear."
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