Man dies on subway as photographer takes a picture for NY POST, Update: Photographer speaks (P. 4)

[scarsorscabs]

That's low even for the Post. Wow.

Never thought the distastefulness of the Post would surprise me, but they just did.

I'm not surprised by it from the Post but I'm still disgusted. Just a poor decision to put that picture with that headline.

 

[r0cs finest]

It's not like dude could have ran to him and picked him up without risking his own life. That train was coming pretty fast. By the time he were to bend down and get him, the poor man would already have been struck.

So its faster to pull out your camera, turn it on, set it up and snap pics???? 

 

[nationaltruckerdave]

Y'all too sensitive, I woulda snapped the pic and sold it to the NY Post too

Gladly profiting off another mans death, when you could have possibly helped them live another day?

Interesting.

And what if I fall in the tracks tryna help him?

In NYC we don't help people we don't know, we mind our business

 

[ez money]

 

[shatterkneesinc]

And what if I fall in the tracks tryna help him?
In NYC we don't help people we don't know, we mind our business

they called it the bystander effect
this is true and its more apparent in populated cities like nyc.

 

[harlemtothebronx]

Y'all too sensitive, I woulda snapped the pic and sold it to the NY Post too

Gladly profiting off another mans death, when you could have possibly helped them live another day?

Interesting.

And what if I fall in the tracks tryna help him?

In NYC we don't help people we don't know, we mind our business

We don't?

Oh.

 

[mrdozo]

The photo of that child is so sad. NY Post is horrible.

 

[hometownhero]

Foul as ****. Photographer set up and got in position for that picture. I highly doubt he was in that (the perfect) position when the guy was first pushed.  He potentially had the chance to something great, instead he started taking pictures. Trying to win a Pulitzer or some ****.

 

[lobotomybeats]

Regardless if the photographer could have saved the guy's life or not, who in their right mind wants to see this? This isn't journalism, this is ****. It's like publishing the pictures from an open-casket funeral. This isn't impactful, this gratuitous blood lust. Whose life is better for seeing that? Run your piece, whatever. The picture isn't needed.

 

[sean c0mbs]

And what if I fall in the tracks tryna help him?
In NYC we don't help people we don't know, we mind our business

really?


View media item 157636

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/03/nyregion/03life.html

 

[puglife]

He stated that after he took the picture, he helped the girl.

not true from what i remember reading about it years ago. the child was crawling to an area with food about 2 miles away when the photographer came up the scene. he took the picture and won his awards, but just left without helping the kid. no one knows what happened to the kid. i hope s/he made it, but it's probably unlikely.

the photographer committed suicide a few years after taking the picture. not saying it was related, but it very well may have been.

 

[hometownhero]

Some of you seem surprised.

After this photo was published in 1994, I realised we live in a sad world...

Spoiler

for those who may not get it, instead of the photographer helping that little girl, he waited and took this image smh

What was the photographer supposed to do?  Adopt the kid?  I'm sure the bird didn't attack the child if thats what you are implying. 

Dude was doing his job.  That is a location thing.  Don't judge the camera man from this one pic. 

It's a location thing, but come on. A malnourished child slumped over in a field and a vulture near by....clearly taken to guide the reader/viewer to the conclusion that the child will be eaten or attacked. 

 

[papageorgeo510]

They know exactly what they're doing and they have been doing this for a long time, desensitizing people from this kind of stuff and making them think this is the norm.

 

[justcallmeeric]

this is pretty sad... on both parts of the newspaper and of the photographer...

sad.......

 

[lobotomybeats]

They know exactly what they're doing and they have been doing this for a long time, desensitizing people from this kind of stuff and making them think this is the norm.

I think it's the exact opposite. I don't think it is as desensitizing as it is sensational. They aren't trying to lull people into thinking they are owed this stuff, they are saying they will provide what no one else will.

 

[hometownhero]

the bird was waiting for the child to die, so it could it eat it

That's what the picture shows you and that's why is so powerful and it delivers the messege...but I doubt the bird actually knows the concept of death and that the child might die any second, I'm sure the bird is there because of the stench of death and decomposition of the area....it just so happens for the bit to be fixated on the child at the exact moment he snapped the pic.

 

[pr0phecy718]

well breaking news, they just caught the guy.....dude shaved his dreadlocks

 

[thorrocksjs]

its like the movie prison song mixed with network.

 

[pr0phecy718]

Anguished fotog: Critics are unfair to condemn me
By R. UMAR ABBASI
Last Updated: 8:50 AM, December 5, 2012
Posted: 12:39 AM, December 5, 2012

View media item 158588
Ki Suk Han, 58, of Queens frantically tries to climb to safety yesterday as a train bears down on him in Midtown. He was fatally struck seconds later.
Post freelance photographer R. Umar Abbasi captured the dramatic moments before Ki Suk Han was struck by a downtown Q train. A day after the pictures were published, a flurry of criticism erupted — from other media and over social media like Twitter. He recounted the or deal to The Post yesterday:

I was on an assignment, waiting for a train at the 49th Street subway platform, when I suddenly heard people gasping.

The announcement had come over the loudspeaker that the train was coming — and out of the periphery of my eye, I saw a body flying through the air and onto the track.

I just started running. I had my camera up — it wasn’t even set to the right settings — and I just kept shooting and flashing, hoping the train driver would see something and be able to stop.

I had no idea what I was shooting. I’m not even sure it was registering with me what was happening. I was just looking at that train coming.

It all went so quickly; from the time I heard the shouting until the time the train hit the man was about 22 seconds.

At the same time, the perp was running toward me. I was afraid he might push me onto the tracks.

View media item 158589
The victim was so far away from me, I was already too far away to reach him when I started running.

The train hit the man before I could get to him, and nobody closer tried to pull him out.

What keeps playing over in my mind, what haunts me when I think back on it, is that the man did not scream at all.

I didn’t hear the man cry for help.

And then I was standing there, with this poor man, twisted like a rag doll, and it was so painfully hopeless.

A young doctor named Laura Kaplan came immediately. She was so brave, the way she remained calm. She asked if anyone knew CPR, and there was a man who kneeled down next to her who said, “I don’t know how to do it, but I will try if you tell me.”

And they just kept trying, even though there was no hope.

Then a crowd came over with camera phones and they were pushing and shoving, trying to look at the man and taking videos.

I was screaming at them to get back, so the doctor could have room because they were closing in on her; she thanked me.

I remember telling a woman — whom I later learned was the MTA chaplain — to give the man his last rites.

It was one of the most horrible things I have ever seen, to watch that man dying there.

When it was over, I didn’t look at the pictures.

I didn’t even know at all that I had even captured the images in such detail. I didn’t look at them. I didn’t want to.

It was just too emotional a day.

I brought the camera memory card back to the office and turned it in. Two detectives came and looked at the photos and I just sat in a chair.

When I finally looked at them late that night, my heart started racing. It was terrible, seeing it happen all over again.

I didn’t sleep at all.

All I can hear is that man’s head against that train: Boom! Boom! Boom!

I have to say I was surprised at the anger over the pictures, of the people who are saying: Why didn’t he put the camera down and pull him out?

But I can’t let the armchair critics bother me. They were not there. They have no idea how very quickly it happened.

They do not know what they would have done.

Before I went into the subway, I had been up in Times Square, and my camera was still set for outside lighting. The flash was on 1/64th of a second, which would be split-second recharging.

People think I had time to set the camera and take photos, and that isn’t the case. I just ran toward that train.

The sad part is, there were people who were close to the victim, who watched and didn’t do anything. You can see it in the pictures.

The truth is I could not reach that man; if I could have, I would have.

But the train was moving faster than I could get there.

 

[3am scholar]

Bystander effect.

 

[tr1ll]

BS. You can tell theres a part of him that feels guilty because he keeps trying to displace the blame.

If he was taking pictures the whole time he was running, why doesn't he release the blurry pics????

 

[sreggie101]

even if he was far away you don't take a picture out of respect for the man's situation regardless if he would've died or not. he died, and dude still went to his editors with the picture like 'yo i got gold for u'.

 

[shogun]

I watched his interview on the Today show. It seemed like he was using the bright flash on his camera to get the attention of the train operator and it just so happened to get decent shots of the guy on the tracks. at him thought for selling the pics and benefitting from it. Give those pics to the police. Now the victim's family has to see that picture all over the news and newspapers .

It seemed like he was far away and there were other people a lot closer to the guy on the track. I'm guessing they just stood there in shock as the victim tried to pick himself up onto the platform. It would've only took one person in that crowd to speak up and ask others to help him get the guy back onto the platform. Most of us haven't been in that situation before so it's difficult to say that we would've acted different but it would weigh heavy on my conscience to not try and help someone who was about to die in front of me. Maybe witnesses can provide an accurate timeline of how quickly it all happened.

 

[scarsorscabs]

Reading what he said and thinking about it, I think it's likely that there's little to nothing the photographer could've done to save the guy/

BUT...a few things just sound sketchy and sensationalized:

At the same time, the perp was running toward me. I was afraid he might push me onto the tracks.

I remember telling a woman — whom I later learned was the MTA chaplain — to give the man his last rites.

So he just happened to tell a woman to give him his last rites and it turns out she was the MTA chaplain?

The sad part is, there were people who were close to the victim, who watched and didn’t do anything. You can see it in the pictures.

Probably in other pictures and in the main one it was probably too late but it looks to me like there was nobody between the photographer and the victim at that point. NY Post's editing?

I don't think he's really at fault but I just got a vibe like he was overcompensting and exaggerating.

 

[derryj3]

There's comes a point in life where you are skeptical about everything, but that doesn't mean you don't believe in ANYTHING.