March 1, 2011. A U.S. Army soldier with the 10th Special Forces Group and his military working dog jump off the ramp of a CH-47 Chinook helicopter from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment during water training over the Gulf of Mexico as part of exercise Emerald Warrior 2011.Manuel J. Martinez—Reuters
Animals have found themselves in the path of peril and at the heart the some of the biggest news stories over the past twelve months, from the Japanese tsunami and Bangkok floods to the war in Libya and the droughts in Africa. While some animals have been sent into the danger zone, the majority of these creatures have simply had the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, victims of circumstance, and at the mercy of nature’s wrath or man’s violent feuds.
When U.S. special-forces stormed a compound and killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the story behind the story was that of the anonymous four-legged member of the eighty-strong team: a bulletproof vest-wearing K-9 military working dog that had taken part in the raid. Elsewhere, the mascot dogs of the Athens protests—Kanellos, Louk and Loukanikos, or”Sausage”—have been photographed countless times amid the protests. The subject of the online world’s attention, the canines have a dedicated Facebook and Wikipage, and are featured in numerous YouTube videos.
The average animal doesn’t make headlines, but countless creatures have been photographed amid the chaos and destruction so widely connected to some of the year’s biggest stories. Here, LightBox looks back on a few furry friends who’ve found themselves in harm’s way in 2011.
January 3, 2011. A snake crosses the Capricorn Highway which is under floodwaters 6km south of Rockhampton. Military aircraft flew supplies to an Australian town slowly disappearing beneath floodwaters, as record flooding in the country's northeast continued to cut coal exports and devastate wheat production.Daniel Munoz—ReutersFebruary 4, 2011. U.S. Marines from 1st Battalion, 8th Marines fire at alleged Taliban fighers as their dog Miely runs around outside new Mirage base in Afghanistan. U.S.-led NATO troops are under a deadline across Afghanistan to train local forces to take responsibility for their country's security by 2014.Dmitry Kostyukov—AFP/Getty ImagesJanuary 13, 2011. Rescue workers removed a live rabbit as they search for survivors inside a home destroyed by a landslide in Teresopolis, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil. At least 350 people have died after landslides hit in January and 50 or more were still missing.Felipe Dana—AP PhotoFebruary 24, 2011. Bahraini Shiite anti-government protesters color a white dove with red paint symbolizing the blood of the victims during a protest march from Pearl Square to Manamas old city by hundreds of Shiites carrying seven symbolic coffins in remembrance of the seven people who were killed in police crackdowns since the demonstrations began on February 14.Joseph Eid—AFP/Getty ImagesMarch 1, 2011. A U.S. Army soldier with the 10th Special Forces Group and his military working dog jump off the ramp of a CH-47 Chinook helicopter from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment during water training over the Gulf of Mexico as part of exercise Emerald Warrior 2011.Manuel J. Martinez—ReutersMarch 18, 2011. A roe deer stands in a forest in the state radiation ecology reserve in the 30 km (19 miles) exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear reactor near the village of Babchin, some 370 km (230 miles) southeast of Minsk, Still inhospitable to humans, the Chernobyl "exclusion zone"—a contaminated 30-km radius around the site of the nuclear reactor explosion of April 26, 1986—is now a nature reserve and teems with different wild animals.
Vasily Fedosenko—Reuters March 23, 2011. The carcass of an octopus lies next to submerged debris in a seawater puddle where the City Hall offices previously stood in the earthquake- and tsunami-destroyed town of Minamisanriku, northeastern Japan. Of the 17,666 people who once lived here, more than 300 have been confirmed dead and thousands more have disappeared.David Guttenfelder—AP PhotoMarch 14, 2011. A girl who has been isolated at a makeshift facility to screen, cleanse and isolate people with high radiation levels, looks at her dog through a window in Nihonmatsu, northern Japan, after a massive earthquake and tsunami that are feared to have killed more than 10,000 people in March.Yuriko Nakao—ReutersApril 7, 2011. Abandoned dogs roam an empty street in the Odaka area of Minamisoma, inside the deserted evacuation zone established for the 20 kilometer radius around the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactors.David Guttenfelder—AP PhotoApril 2, 2011. A dove sits on the wreckage of a burned-out vehicle at the UN headquarters in Mazar-i-Sharif, after protesters attacked the compound April 1. A mob enraged by a Koran burning in the US stormed a UN compound in Afghanistan and killed seven staff, the worst attack on the world body in the country since the 2001 invasion. Shah Marai—AFP/Getty ImagesApril 17, 2011. A group of deer walk through one of the affected areas of Coahuila, Mexico, where wild fires have destroyed more than 103 hecatres of forests and bushes. EPAApril 22, 2011. Birds sit on a submerged wrecked car as seagulls flying overhead are reflected in the water of a river amid the tsunami devastation in Kesennuma, Miyagi prefecture. On April 22, Japan announced a $49 billion special budget for areas devastated by last month's quake and tsunami and said it would extend an evacuation zone around a nuclear plant crippled by the disaster. Yasuyoshi Chiba—AFP/Getty ImagesA butterfly hovers over a flower as smoke rises around the Lee Valley Recreational area in the Apache National Forest during back burn operations as the Wallow Fire continues to burn in Big Lake, Arizona. The wild fire which is reported as 45 percent contained has spread over more than 600 square miles as it crossed the border into New Mexico, destroying over twenty structures, the majority in the resort town of Greer, and threatened thousands more.Kevork Djansezian—Getty ImagesJune 7, 2011. A cat stands in front of armed Yemeni tribesmen loyal to dissident tribal leader Sheikh Sadiq al-Ahmar as they inspect damage inside his house in Sanaa following days of battles between his fighters and government forces. Ahmad Gharabli—AFP/Getty ImagesJune 13, 2011. Sheep lie dead after they were killed by a bomb blast in Quetta, Pakistan. A bomb planted on a bicycle wounded two people in the southwestern city of Quetta, intelligence officials said. Naseer Ahmed—ReutersJune 29, 2011. Deer interact with each other with smoke still covering the town of Los Alamos from the Las Conchas fires still burning near Los Alamos, New Mexico. About 12,000 people was placed under a mandatory evacuation in the town of Los Alamos and the Los Alamos National Laboratory home to the nation's largest supply of nuclear weapons was shut down. Larry W. Smith—EPAJuly 29, 2011. A camel suckles at its mother's udder at a water point in the Kenya-Somalia border town of Liboi. In July, the United Nations declared famine on two parts of southern Somalia.Thomas Mukoya—ReutersJuly 5, 2011. Doves sit on the branches of a tree in the Dadaab refugee camp in northeastern Kenya. Dadaab, a complex of three settlements, is the world's largest refugee camp. Built to house 90,000 people and home to more than four times that number, it was already well over its maximum capacity before an influx of 30,000 refugees in the month of June. Roberto Schmidt—AFP/Getty ImagesJuly 29, 2011. U.S. Marine Cpl. Abraham Willis, 22, of Beech Bottom, W. Va., with the 2nd Battalion 12th Marines based in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, and his IED detection dog Preacher ride in the back of a wagon as they are shuttled over a bridge for a foot patrol at sunrise in Kajaki, Helmand province, Afghanistan. David Goldman—AP PhotoAugust 9, 2011. A dog jumps as it is hit by a water cannon, used on students staging a rally to demand changes in the public state education system, in Santiago.Cristobal Saavedra—ReutersAugust 11, 2011. A squirrel flees as firemen combat a forest fire that stated at Santo Amaro de Tavares, Viseu, central Portugal.Nuno Andre Ferreira—EPAAugust 19, 2011. A gazelle stands in what local residents say is the bombed out ruins of the compound of Abdullah Al-Senussi, head of the Libyan Intelligence Service and brother in law of Muammar Gaddafi in Tripoli.Paul Hackett—ReutersSeptember 5, 2011. A Palestinian rides his donkey through a burning field as an Israeli army jeep drives by, after arsonists set fire to an olive grove in the West Bank village of Burin, near Nablus. Nasser Ishtayeh—AP PhotoSeptember 6, 2011. Billy, a mountain goat taken in by soldiers with the U.S. Army's Bravo Company of the 25th Infantry Division, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Battalion 27th Infantry Regiment based in Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, looks over the Kunar River.David Goldman—AP PhotoSeptember 7, 2011. A cat that appears to have been overcome by a wildfire lays in front of a destroyed home near Bastrop, Texas. Low winds and better weather gave firefighters opportunity to get a handle of the wildfires that devastated central Texas. LM Otero—AP PhotoSeptember 15, 2011. 2nd Lt. Andrew Ferrara, 23, of Torrance, Calif., with the U.S. Army's Bravo Company of the 25th Infantry Division, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Battalion 27th Infantry Regiment, based in Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, is confronted by a charging cow while trying to secure the landing zone for an incoming helicopter during a mission.David Goldman—AP PhotoOctober 5, 2011. A protester hurls rocks at riot police during a demonstration in Athens' Syntagma (Constitution) square. Police fired tear gas at stone-throwing youths in central Athens, where thousands of striking state sector workers marched against cuts the government says are needed to save the nation from bankruptcy. Yannis Behrakis—ReutersOctober 18, 2011. The view of a street after clashes between Libyan interim government forces and loyalists of Muammar Gaddafi in Sirt.Esam Al-Fetori—ReutersOctober 27, 2011. A local resident sleeps with her dog on an elevated bed that stands in the floodwaters in China town near the Chao Praya river in Bangkok. Thousands of Bangkok residents flocked to bus, rail and air terminals while heavy traffic snaked out of the sprawling Thai capital in an exodus from a mass of approaching floodwater. NIcolas Asfouri—AFP/Getty ImagesOctober 26, 2011. Led by a boy, malnourished horses walk from a passageway in Tripoli's medina.Alessio Romenzi—CorbisNovember 16, 2011. An abandoned dog sits on a concrete pipe at a flooded area in Bangkok. Sukree Sukplang—Reuters
