Edmond Terakopian, a good friend of mine from London, has just sent me a link to his account of what it’s like working as a photographer for Associated Press when there’s been a terrorist attack and it just happens to be in your own city. The account was written for The Digital Journalist’s August 2005 edition.

July 7, 2005. I was looking forward to today. Yesterday had ended on a high. London had been nominated as the Olympic City for 2012. I had two excellent assignments today; the first was an 8.30a.m. photo-call at the Natural History Museum to photograph a new diamond exhibition. The second was an exclusive look at how the police were monitoring the security for the G8 summit from their secret control center.

There must have been around 20 photographers waiting to photograph the world’s largest uncut diamond. I was waiting patiently, macro lens and lights in hand, for my turn. As I contemplated getting a coffee, my phone rang; it was the Press Association office, for whom I was working. “There’s been an explosion at Aldgate East tube station. Get there. They’re saying it’s a power surge.” I caught everyone’s attention as I started to pack away my gear. Slowly, the others began to get calls.

I got in my car with a friend from AP and we started making our way as quickly as traffic allowed. The phone rang, “There’s been a second explosion at Edgware Road tube. Go there instead as you’re closer.” My heart sank. This was no longer an accident as originally thought. How can there be two explosions on the tube in the same morning? I knew it must be terrorism. I began to think of 9/11. The first plane could have been an accident …

Anyway, I first met Edmond at a 24 April event outside the Turkish Embassy in 1994. Obviously, as you can tell by his surname, he’s a British Armenian and was extremely active in the London-Armenian community and more than that, has always been passionate about photography and a source of encouragement for others like myself.

Emil Danielyan from RFE/RL tells me that he also saw Edmond interviewed on CNN about the terrorist attacks although of course, like many others, we wish there had been nothing to photograph at all on that fateful day. Incidentally, Edmond has a web site which apart from the front splash screen, I put together. It’s at http://www.pix.org.uk.