Submitted by kkommineni on
U.S. Marine Sergeant Anthony Zabala of 1st Combat Engineering Battalion, 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade, runs to safety as an improvised explosive device (IED) explodes in the Garmsir district of Helmand Province, Afghanistan, July 13, 2009. A foot patrol was advancing when the blast shot a cloud of dust and rocks into the sky, killing Sergeant Michael W. Heede and Staff Sergeant David S. Spicer.
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A torn American flag flies over a cemetery in Tuba, Arizona, where Thomasina Nez's former partner and father to five of her children is buried. The Bennett Freeze ban, instituted in 1966, prohibited home and property improvements on land in Arizona that was disputed by the Navajo and Hopi tribes. The law left 1.5 million acres frozen in bureaucracy until it was reversed in March 2009.
Submitted by kkommineni on
These mosquitoes are being used to create a malaria vaccine thought to be the Holy Grail of malaria control. Mosquitoes kill more people than any other insect or animal. By transmitting malaria from human to human, mosquitoes are responsible for as many as 2.5 million deaths a year. Nearly half the world's population lives under the threat of contracting malaria. The parasite prays on the most vulnerable of society: at least 700,000 children under 5 years of age will die this year. The disease takes an economic toll, too.
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A Jewish settler throws wine at a Palestinian woman in the West Bank city of Hebron, March 10, 2009. Hebron is a center of conflict between the two groups.
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Vibe lies in a hospital bed in the living room of her home in Hundested, Denmark, while her parents, Michael and Helle, eat dinner with a friend. In her last days, Vibe lost almost all ability to move or speak. Only occasionally was she able to gesture with her left hand or make a small sound. Michael used to say that he would catch the stars in the sky if Vibe asked him to. Now he tells Vibe's twin sister Laerke that Vibe has become one of those stars.
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Specialist Codey Johnson cries by the side of Specialist T. J. Fecteau in the Tangi Valley, Wardak Province, Afghanistan, September 8, 2009. Fecteau was injured during an improvised explosive device (IED) attack on his mine- resistant ambush-protected vehicle. The Tangi Valley, on the doorstep of Kabul, had become a hotbed of insurgency and had not seen a permanent coalition force until the arrival of the U.S. Army's 102-man Apache Company on July 12, 2009. In early August, Apache Company saw 26 soldiers injured and one killed in action, all from IEDs.
Submitted by kkommineni on
Columbia College men's basketball coach Bob Burchard dances in the locker room following the Columbia Cougars' victory over MidAmerica Nazarene University in the national semifinals of the NAIA Division I National Championship on March 23, 2009 at Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City, Missouri. As the unranked Cougars continued to win throughout the tournament, Burchard told his team to "just keep riding the wave."
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A boy on his way back from cutting the grass in Sa Pao, Cambodia. The yearly monsoon rains provide much needed respite from the tropical heat and bring life-sustaining water for crops and livestock. But standing water left behind also provides a breeding ground for malaria-bearing mosquitoes. As a result, in the humid aftermath of the monsoon, infection and mortality rates increase. Paradoxically, intense rain adversely affects mosquito reproduction by disturbing the standing water enough to lower hatching rates. However, populations can increase when the rain lessens.
Submitted by kkommineni on
An inspector combs through the rubble in the parking garage of the Pearl Continental Hotel in Peshawar, Pakistan, on June 10, 2009. A car bomb there the day before killed 17 people.
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As in any society, the North Cemetery has its social classes. At the bottom of the cemetery's hierarchy are the squatters, who live in shanties perched on top of the wall of tombs that forms the northern exterior wall. The most populated area of the burial grounds, roughly 100 families live here.
