I took an express subway train from Times Square to Chamber Street,

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Why it worked

The video leverages the immense historical gravity of the subject matter and the personal, first-hand testimony of a witness to create a compelling, high-stakes narrative.

Summary

Photographer Richard Drew recounts the experience of capturing the iconic 'Falling Man' photograph during the 9/11 attacks. He discusses the quiet nature of the image and the editorial decisions made by newspapers to publish it.

Structure

1Richard Drew describes arriving at the scene of the 9/11 attacks.
2He explains the moment he began photographing people falling from the towers.
3He reflects on the unique, quiet quality of the 'Falling Man' image.
4He recounts discovering the photo on his computer and the editorial reaction to its publication.
5He concludes by discussing the historical significance of the photograph.

On-screen text

THE FALLING MAN 2001 THE STORY BEHIND RICHARD DREW'S PHOTOGRAPH THE FOLLOWING VIDEO CONTAINS GRAPHIC IMAGES THAT MAY BE DISTURBING TO SOME VIEWERS THE NEW YORK TIMES SEPTEMBER 12, 2001 ESQUIRE SEPTEMBER 2003

Transcript

Original caption

“Falling Man” is one of the widely recognized photographs from 9/11. The most widely seen images from the attacks are of planes and towers, not people. Photographer Richard Drew was documenting the burning World Trade Center when an EMT pointed out people falling from the buildings. Drew followed them with his camera, but he didn’t realize he had captured the photograph that would become known as “Falling Man” until he returned to the office. The identity of the man in the photograph remains unknown, though he is believed to have been an employee at Windows on the World, the restaurant atop the North Tower. More than two decades later, the photograph remains one of the most impactful images of 9/11. #9/11 #fallingman #news

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I took an express subway train from Times Square to Chamber Street, which is the stop just before the World Trade Center. The first thing I saw was the two World Trade Centers. Both of them had smoke and fire coming from them. I just started making my pictures. I was photographing the burning building when EMT says, "oh my gosh, look at that." And we started seeing people coming down of the building. I instinctively picked up my camera and started photographing them, following them as they came down. Until I photographed what has become known as the Falling Man, it's a very quiet photograph. It's not like a lot of other violent photographs from other disasters. There's no blood, there's no guts, there's nobody getting shot. But people react to it in a way that they feel that they can relate to this photograph. That they might have been in the same situation, and they might have had to make whatever choice the man in the photograph made. You have to be very aware of your surroundings when you're in a situation like this, you have to be careful that you don't become a victim. Journalists don't run away from a falling building. We don't run away from the fire. We run to it because it's our job to record history. I didn't know I had that photograph of that man in that position until I actually saw it on my computer when I got back to the office. I called one of our photo editors and I showed him the picture and I said, "this is it, this has got to be the picture." This man was like an arrow bisecting the two World Trade Centers. I woke up the next morning and I opened up the paper, and there was my photograph of Falling Man. It was a very brave thing for them to use that picture. It was the only picture that was like that of anybody falling from the building. The only picture that showed any kind of human interaction like that. A paper in Allentown, Pennsylvania, used the picture, they put it on their whole back page in the newspaper. Then the editor said that it was that important a photograph, and he got a lot of mail, letters to the editor saying he shouldn't have run this, this is not something I want my children to see. Tom Junod, the author of the Esquire article, he's the one who came up with the name "The Falling Man." That was the name of the article, and it sort of stuck. I've never regretted taking that photograph at all. It's probably one of the only photographs that actually shows someone dying that day. We have a terrorist attack on our own soil, and we still don't see pictures of our people dying and this is a photograph of someone dying.