Re: [Leica] get the shot or walk on by?

[Jeff Moore <jbm@oven.com>]

2000-04-11-11:53:14 Kyle Cassidy:
> so, totally unrelated hypotheical question ... you just happen to be
> standing around (with your leica of course, because you always carry
> it with you) and you witness a Tragic Event [...]

I can report what I did in one such case -- and it wasn't so much a
case of deciding what to do as simply watching what I happened to do.

Okay, it may or may not have been a Tragic Event.  It was certainly
a Traumatic Event.  I was walking down an avenue in eastern Midtown,
NYC, when there was a screech and a thump.  The taxi which had done
the thumping was stopped in the middle of the street; the thumpee, a
food-delivery guy in Deli whites, was splayed out in the street about
three feet from the front of the cab; the taxi driver was hurrying
toward the front of the car, his door left open, looking sick.  It was a
good picture.  And I had an M all loaded up with film right there in my
bag.

I thought about what a good picture it was as I pulled out my
cellphone and dialled 911.  I told myself I'd take the picture after
I'd summoned emergency assistance.  Of course, I never did -- a crowd
gathered, cars rolled by in the other lane, everything got cluttered; 
the simple, dramatic moment was gone.  But there really wasn't
anything else I could do, and not feel like a heel.  Perhaps I'd have
felt free to operate differently had I been assigned to take pictures, 
and had there already been police on the scene.

As an aside, let me put in a plug for other New Yorkers and for the
emergency services people -- when I got through, the 911 operator
already knew about the accident and said that help had already been
dispatched to the scene; and nobody could've gotten more than a
ten-second jump on me making the call.  Good call-center coordination,
and some pretty speedy-fingered Samaritans.  Less than 30 seconds later,
I heard the sirens a few blocks away.  Should anything terrible happen
to me, I hope I get that kind of response!