Helmut Fricke, who understands fashion as his specialty, but as an editorial photographer for the FAZ, had already photographed all topics in the world, immediately set off: from the hotel in Midtown by taxi to the roadblock on Hudson Street, from there to Walk further towards the disaster.
In front of the Woolworth Building, very close to the twin towers that had been hit, there was no getting through.
The police stopped everyone from approaching.
“Get out,” they called.
"Go North!"
Alfons Kaiser
Responsible editor for the section “Germany and the World” and the Frankfurter Allgemeine Magazin.
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Suddenly there was a loud bang.
9:59 a.m., everyone looked up.
A ball of fire emerged from the southern tower.
"My God," shouted the people running out of the office buildings on the southern tip of Manhattan.
"Out!
Out!
Shouted the police officers.
Hundreds, thousands, ran toward the Brooklyn Bridge, out of harm's way.
Helmut Fricke stopped at a street lamp so that he was not overrun, turned around and picked up the fugitives, who were soon enveloped by the huge cloud of dust.
In doing so, he achieved unique shots. And that says something, because in the capital of photography, to which hundreds of photographers had traveled for the fashion week and where the annual meeting of Magnum members had taken place the previous evening, as well as the many laypeople, an infinite number of professionals also took shocking pictures. But most of the photos of the most photographed disaster in history show either the collapsing towers or the fleeing people because of the narrow streets and tall buildings in downtown Manhattan. Helmut Fricke had found an angle on the driveway to the Brooklyn Bridge where he could record both together - the falling debris of the south tower in the background and a woman in the foreground screaming in panic while walking.
Helmut Fricke coped with the catastrophe, which luckily did not hit him himself, but only covered him in white dust from top to bottom, in his own way: He stayed nine more days in the city of cities and kept taking photos. The relatives who had put photos of their loved ones on the wall because they did not know whether they had died or perhaps had been taken to a hospital. The firefighters who mourned their many dead comrades. The people who cheered the rescue and evacuation teams on the West Side Highway when they returned from their work at “Ground Zero”. And the crooked steel framework that protruded from the pile of rubble. Helmut Fricke recorded everything the way he took photos at fashion weeks: with a close look and sober meticulousness.The memories may be deceptive after such a long time - the photos capture the disaster best.