Re: The Most Powerful Photographs of 2011

 

A woman carries her injured son through flood waters at Pahanga village in Orissa's Jajpur district. Monsoon rains collapsed mud huts and flooded wide swaths of north and east India, leaving hundreds of thousands of people marooned in the raging waters

 

 

Anna Hazare meditates at Rajghat before beginning his fast for a stringent Lokpal Bill

 

 

A leopard leaps on an armed forest guard in Prakash Nagar village, near Siliguri, India

 

Thousands gather outside The Writers' Buildings in Kolkata awaiting Mamata Banerjee's first appearance as Chief Minister of West Bengal after a landslide victory that ended the Left's 34-year rule in the state

 

The first of six IAF C-130J Super Hercules takes to the skies for its maiden flight

 

Robert Peraza, who lost his son Robert David Peraza in 9/11, pauses at his son's name at the North Pool of the 9/11 Memorial

 

 

A whirpool forms off the Japanese coast after the tsunami on March 11

 

This sightseeing boat, Hama Yuri, was pulled 1300 feet from the coast and somehow balanced itself on a two story house during the tsunami in Japan

 

 

Members of the national security team receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in the Situation Room of the White House on May 1

 

Two lights from the former site of the World Trade Centers shine for the 10th anniversary of 9/11

 

Phyllis Siegel, 76, left, and Connie Kopelov, 84, both of New York, embrace after becoming the first same-sex couple to get married at the Manhattan City Clerk's office

 

A protester gets sprayed in the face with pepper spray at an Occupy Portland protest

 

A massive tornado that tore a 6-mile (10-kilometer) path across southwestern Missouri killed at least 89 people as it slammed into the city of Joplin. Here, residents of Joplin walk down the street after the May 22 tornado

 

 

Friends and loved ones gather at the Oslo cathedral to mourn 93 victims killed in twin terror attacks from a bombing in downtown Oslo and a mass shooting on Utoya island on July 24

 

 

A monstrous dust storm (Haboob) roars through Phoenix, Arizona in July

A policeman detains an opposition activist in Baku on March 12. Azerbaijan police detained more than 30 activists of the opposition Musavat Party when its members took to the street of Baku to protest against the ruling elite following a similar rally a day before

 

Christians protect Muslims during prayer in Cairo, Egypt. Via Nevine Zaki

 

 

An aerial shot of the damage immediately following the Japanese tsunami

 

 

A girl in isolation for radiation screening looks at her dog through a window in Nihonmatsu, Japan on March 14

 

A man sits in front of a destroyed apartment building following the Joplin, Missouri tornado

 

A University of California Davis police officer pepper-sprays students during their sit-in at an 'Occupy UCD' demonstration in Davis, California

 

A mother comforts her son in Concord, Alabama, near his house which was completely destroyed by a tornado in April

 

Chile's Puyehue volcano erupts, causing air traffic cancellations across South America, New Zealand, Australia and forcing over 3,000 people to evacuate

 

New Yorkers celebrate the death of Osama Bin Laden at Times Square. Bin Laden was killed by US Navy SEALS in a pre-dawn raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

 

Slain Navy SEAL Jon Tumilson's dog 'Hawkeye' lies next to his casket during funeral services in Rockford, Iowa. Tumilson was one of 30 American soldiers killed in Afghanistan on August 6 when their helicopter was shot down during a mission to help fellow troops who had come under fire