First-person pieces are rare at the AP. But as the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks approached, two AP journalists inextricably tied to the war in Afghanistan turned in stunning introspective accounts of wounds both seen and unseen.
AP investigative reporter James LaPorta wanted to tell a story that haunts him from his military service in Afghanistan. And staff photographer Emilio Morenatti, making photographs for a story about Tokyo-bound Paralympians, was motivated to look for answers to his own story, adapting to life after losing a leg in an explosion in Afghanistan.
AP investigative reporter James LaPorta and his son Joel, 5, at home in Boca Raton, Fla., Sept. 7, 2021.
AP Photo / Marta Lavandier
LaPorta, a U.S. Marine veteran with two tours of Afghanistan, was hoping to contribute to the 9/11 anniversary package AP’s Ted Anthony was coordinating. But rather than writing about his original idea — soldiers killed in action in Afghanistan — it was decided LaPorta would write about an indelible experience he had in-country, one of many difficult memories of that time still having a negative effect on his life.
He relates the experience of watching on video as a young Afghan boy unwittingly jumped on a mine until it exploded. The boy was killed instantly. The images have stuck with LaPorta since that day in 2013 and resurfaced as he watched his own young son jumping up and down to “Ho Hey,” a Lumineers song with poignant lyrics.
As LaPorta wrote in his recollection, “I look around me. What do my people know of this war, of its blood spilled and treasure lost, of me?” His riveting account gives a glimpse of the burden LaPorta lives with every day — and his story resonated around the world as seen in the thousands of retweets it received. The piece tracked at or near the top of AP’s stories for three days.
Tom Davis rides his bicycle as part of his daily training, along a road near his home in Fremont, Ind., Aug. 17, 2021. Twenty years after the attacks of Sept. 11, Davis was one of the small group of American combat veterans competing in the Tokyo Paralympics — a corps of elite athletes who have triumphed over catastrophic injuries they suffered in Iraq and Afghanistan.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Tom Davis wipes sweat from his forehead after riding his bicycle as part of his daily training in Fremont, Ind., Aug. 17, 2021. If he hadn’t lost his leg, “I would never have grown into the person I am now,” he said. “Not even just racing a bike or whatever, but as a human being and as a husband and as a dad. ... I wouldn’t give all that back. Just to walk?”
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Tom Davis, his wife Jamie and their kids, offer a blessing before dinner at their home in Fremont, Ind., Aug. 17, 2021. “I can’t continue to be that guy that got blown up in Ramadi,” the city outside Baghdad where a hidden bomb threw his armored vehicle high into the air, costing the soldier much of his left leg. A tattoo on his forearm reads, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Tom Davis rides his bicycle along a road near his house as part of his daily training in Fremont, Ind., Aug. 17, 2021.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Freddie De Los Santos, center, is comforted by Tom Davis, left, after losing in the Men's H5 Road Race at the Fuji International Speedway during the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics, Sept. 1, 2021. De Los Santos says combat taught him to thrive on pain, making him a relentless competitor. “You enjoy the pain,” he said. “Sometimes, that pain is your best enemy. When I’m racing and I start to feel the pain, I say ‘How are you doing?’”
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Freddie De Los Santos stands next to his bicycle before his daily training in Hopewell Junction, N.Y., Aug. 19, 2021. His life changed in 2009, when a rocket-propelled grenade ripped into his vehicle in an Afghan village. He remembers his beard burning, and grabbing his leg after it was ripped off by the blast.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Freddie De Los Santos rides his bicycle as part of his daily training in Hopewell Junction, N.Y., Aug. 19, 2021.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Freddie De Los Santos sits in his garage before his daily training in Hopewell Junction, N.Y., Aug. 19, 2021. De Los Santos, 51, who grew up in a rough New York City neighborhood at the height of the crack cocaine epidemic, has created an idyllic small-town life north of the city.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Freddie De Los Santos kisses his wife Jeanette at their home in Hopewell Junction, N.Y., Aug. 19, 2021. “I function pretty well right now, but it hasn’t been easy,” he says. He credits psychotherapy, along with a deep Christian faith, a very patient family, a love for painting and cycling.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Melissa Stockwell sits on the edge of a pool at a sports complex during her daily training in Colorado Springs, Colo., Aug. 6, 2021. “I’m not saying it’s all unicorns and rainbows every day all day,” she said. But “I accepted the loss of my leg early on, and that acceptance propelled me.”
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Melissa Stockwell plays with her children, Dallas and Millie, at their home in Colorado Springs, Colo., Aug. 7, 2021. “I’ve always been an optimistic person,” she says. “Probably annoyingly optimistic to lots of people.”
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Melissa Stockwell pauses during her swimming at a sports complex during a daily training in Colorado Springs, Colo., Aug. 6, 2021.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Melissa Stockwell reacts arriving at the finish line in the Women's Triathlon PTS2 at Odaiba Marine Park in the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, Aug. 28, 2021.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Luis Puertas fixes his prosthetic blades to his residual limbs during one of his daily training sessions in a sports complex in Orlando, Fla., Aug. 9, 2021.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Luis Puertas runs with his prosthetic blades during one of his daily training sessions at a sports complex in Orlando, Fla., Aug. 9, 2021. He’s matter of fact about his injuries: “In the Paralympics everybody has a story. There’s always some guy whose story is worse.” But the first years were rough.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Luis Puertas carries his prosthetic blades as he arrives at the airport in Orlando, Fla., Aug. 9, 2021, for a flight to Tokyo for the 2020 Paralympics. Puertas, 34, lost both his legs in September 2006 as he patrolled a crowded Baghdad neighborhood. His legs were severed when a massive IED blasted through his armored vehicle.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Brad Snyder, who lost his sight in Afghanistan in 2011, works out with his wife Sara in their garage in Princeton, N.J., Aug. 5, 2021. They met a few years ago through a friend. She is, he says, the most beautiful woman in the world. He has never seen her.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Brad Snyder prepares tea for his wife, Aug. 4, 2021, in their Princeton, N.J., kitchen, decorated with a flag handcrafted by Brooklyn firefighters using recycled firehose. Loss of his sight, he says, seems to matter more to other people.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Brad Snyder holds a U.S. flag at the National Stadium after winning the Men's Triathlon PTV1 at the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, Aug. 27, 2021.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Brad Snyder bites his gold medal after winning the Men's Triathlon PTV1 in the 2020 Toyko Paralympics, Aug. 27, 2021.
AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti
Morenatti, a 2021 Pulitzer Prize winner, wanted to share his feelings about being an amputee among other amputees trying to excel despite their injuries. Morenatti saw an opportunity to talk to five Paralympians, all victims of combat injuries in Iraq or Afghanistan, as the chance to explore the question: “Can disability actually give us more than it has taken?”
With reporter Tim Sullivan, he first made a cross country trip to talk to the five athletes, then met up again with them in Tokyo, where he was covering the Paralympics. He and Sullivan produced a compelling package on the five competitors, and Morenatti related his own experience in his deeply moving first-person piece. In covering the athletes’ individual stories and in listening to the Paralympians, Morenatti was better able to understand his own journey and come to terms with life as an amputee, appreciating what he has: “Each of us must come to our own conclusions. But I look at my life, and I am happy.”
For sharing their intimate, heart-wrenching experiences tied to the war in Afghanistan, and giving readers personal insight into a major news story, Emilio Morenatti and James LaPorta are AP’s Best of the Week — Second Winners.
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