Monday, February 28, 2011

1985 photo of Omayra Sanchez - first broadcast of the pain and death of a human being

 Photography Frank Fournier Omayra Sanchez Photo Press World

Many see this photo from 1985 as the beginning of what we nowadays call "media globalization", because Omayra Sanchez's agony was followed by television cameras from all over the world. Despite all the footage that was recorded by those tv cameras, it was this photograph, of a shocking reality and humanity, that went down in history as the first broadcast of the pain and death of a human being.


Omayra Sanchez, 13 years old, was the victim of volcano Nevado del Ruiz's eruption in 1985, that devasted the Armero village, in Colombia. Omayra was trapped for three days under the mud, clay and water that was left from her own house. When the paramedics, with scarce resources, tried to help her, they sadly realized there was nothing they could do, since to remove her from the deadly trap they would have to amputate her legs and the lack of a speacilist on the scene would result in her death.

rest at http://obviousmag.org/en/archives/2008/08/photographs_that_shook_the_world_omayra_sanchez.html

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