Photojournalist Nick Ut reunites with “Napalm girl” 50 years after taking his historic photo

The shocking photo, popularly known as the ‘Napalm Girl’ photo, was captured in 1972, depicting Phan Thi Kim Phuc, a nine-year-old girl, running naked along the road crying from burns inflicted by a napalm bomb dropped by the US in the southern province of Tay Ninh.

The moment captured in the photo is more powerful than a thousand words as it not only tells the painful story of children in a small village during the war, but it has become a symbolic image for the senselessness and cruelty of the war.

It is one of the most haunting “portraits” in global photography, contributing to changing the world's view of the Vietnam War and has touched the hearts of peace-loving people.

The Pulitzer-winning 'Napalm Girl' 1972. (Photo courtesy of AP/ Nick Ut)

The picture brought Nick Ut a Pulitzer Prize in 1973. In 2010, it was voted by the UK’s New Statesman magazine as the most impressive news photo of all time. It was then featured in the UK History Channel’s series entitled ‘Photos that change the world’.

The photo is being displayed at the Vietnam Press Museum, along with touching stories from when Nick Ut took the nine-year-old girl Kim Phuc to the hospital and saved the girl’s life.

50 years have gone by; marking the journey of Kim Phuc to heal the wounds on her body while photographer author Nick Ut’s obsession with war has been gradually relieved.

Both of them have been active in social activities and travelled to many countries around the world to spread messages against war, calling for love and protection of women and children.

At their meeting at the Vietnam Press Museum on October 31, Nick Ut and Kim Phuc recounted many touching details behind the historical photo ‘Napalm Girl’.

Nick Ut was only 21 and was working as a photographer of the Associated Press (AP) when he took the photo

He said that he always remembers the image of Kim Phuc when she was 9 years old. “I cried when I saw Phuc with numerous wounds on her body,” he recalled, adding that Phuc cried bitterly to his brother and kept saying “I would die”.

“I couldn't leave, so I quickly took Phuc to the hospital. Now I’, happy to see Phuc again, I consider her like my daughter,” he stated.

He said he is glad to see that his photo not only had a great influence during the Vietnam War, but still appears in many anti-war protests around the world too.

Participants at the event.

Speaking at the event, journalist Ho Quang Loi, former Vice President of the Vietnam Journalists’ Association, affirmed that this is a special meeting, because after 50 years, Nick Ut and Kim Phuc have met again here in Vietnam.

He praised that the amazing power of photojournalism and its impacts on the photographers, the characters featured in the photos, and the world in general.

Nick Ut did not place the priority on sending the photo to the editorial office, but instead he decided to save the girl's lives first.

Journalist Ho Quang Loi, former Vice President of the Vietnam Journalists’ Association

He hailed that Nick Ut did not place the priority on sending the photo to the editorial office, but instead he decided to save the girl's lives first.

For her part, Phan Thi Kim Phuc, who now lives a happy life with her husband, two sons and grandchildren, was also deeply touched to reunite with her benefactor in Vietnam after half a century.

She said that when she was a child, she didn’t like the photo and even hated it because she felt herself as being so ugly in it. She also didn't know how famous the photo had become.

But later, her perception gradually changed and she felt grateful to Uncle Nick Ut for the act of saving her in that moment and the photo he took.

“I feel happy to help others with a picture that conveys a message of love, hope and forgiveness,” she said.

On the occasion of the meeting, photographer Nick Ut presented the Vietnam Press Museum with a number of objects he had used for work in the 1970s, including a soldier’s water bottle he used to soothe the wounds of Kim Phuc.

Previously, Nick Ut had donated two cameras and 52 original photo documents he took in during wartime and after 1975 in Vietnam to the museum.