lifestyle

Photographers Share the Saddest Thing They’ve Shot

5.

I was with a group exploring the interior of a massive dam overflow tunnel, photographing a guy as he rappelled 300ft down into the shaft. Right as I clicked the shutter, his equipment disengaged from the rope and he fell ~30 ft onto concrete, impacting right in front of me. I thought for sure he was dead, but luckily (?) he had only snapped his femur, and we had to construct a makeshift stretcher out of tripods and inflatable raft to get him out.

6.

One I took that I never processed is from a trip to the zoo I took in India. My uncle bribed the keepers to let us and the other people in the party into the Tiger feeding area, where we’d get an up close look at the Tigers. The Tigers were called in and locked in their cages, they were obviously distressed and the keepers were banging on their cages in order to get them to roar for us. I had taken one shot, without flash, before I noticed how distressed the Tigers were getting, at which point I just put my camera down and walked away, I also didn’t follow when my uncle repeated this with the Lions.

7.

I shot the slow death of children by meningitis in the Sudan. I saw many children on their death beds and one died in front of me. Watching innocent children die of something that is fully treatable here in the states is incredibly difficult.

8.

My best friend almost died in a car accident. I drove 700 hundred and some miles to be bedside with him in the ICU, then up and back again once he was done with his two weeks in a brain trauma rehabilitation center to get him moved back home and settled in.

Written by Irvi Torremoro

Irvi Torremoro is an Austinite by way of Las Vegas. She's worked in various outlets in food & beverage and is now focused on writing, eating all the things, talking about Beyonce, and petting all the puppies. She runs flavorandbounty.com, a lifestyle blog about people in the service industry.