AP photographer Richard Drew retraces the steps that led him to the ‘Falling Man’

Joe Pompeo
·Media Reporter

As part of the Yahoo! News "9/11 Remembered" series marking the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks, I profiled Richard Drew, the AP photographer who captured the famous "Falling Man" shot that became the subject of 2003 Esquire piece by Tom Junod.

Earlier this summer, I accompanied Drew to the spot where he took the "Falling Man" photo a block from Ground Zero. He retraced his steps from that day for the first time in 10 years, telling me of his experience: "I get so caught up in the adrenaline of doing this job. So, looking back on it, I think a lot about being able to go home to my family every night. Whether I decide to think about it daily or not, it's always in the back of my mind."

Here's an excerpt from the piece:

Richard Drew put down his camera bag and looked up at the colossal skyscraper that seemed to be racing toward the clouds at an accelerated clip.

"I don't like coming down here," he admitted.

"I'm really surprised how fast this building's gone up," he said of the rising edifice at 1 World Trade Center, peering at the monolith from beneath the brim of a tan baseball cap. "I just hope it isn't another target."

It was around 2 p.m. on a bright Wednesday afternoon in mid-July, and Drew, a veteran Associated Press photographer with wire-rimmed glasses and a neatly cropped silver beard that betrays his 64 years, was standing near the northwest intersection of Vesey and West streets in Lower Manhattan, across from the noisy jungle gym of cranes and steel where a global business hub is currently being reconstructed. Nine years and two months earlier in this very spot -- now an austere pedestrian plaza in the shadow of the Goldman Sachs building -- Drew took a picture that became one of the most iconic images of one of the most catastrophic events in American history.

You can read the rest here. There are more than a dozen profiles in the series so far, including Dylan Stableford's sit-down with CNN producer Rose Marie Arce. A new profile will be rolled out each day through September 11.