Geolocation
Airwars assessment
Seven civilians were reported killed as a result of indiscriminate shelling on Misurata by Gaddafi forces. Among them were two internationally known photojournalists, Tim Hetherington and Chris Hondros.
The BBC reported: “Briton Tim Hetherington, 40, is said to have been killed in a rocket-propelled grenade attack. US photographer Chris Hondros, 41, was also killed, and two others, including Briton Guy Martin, were injured.”
A former colleague later said they were indeed killed by a mortar shell: “Sebastian Junger had planned to be along on that assignment. ‘At the last minute, I couldn’t go,’ he told Koppel. ‘Tim went on his own, and was hit with a fragment from an .81 mm mortar, the same mortar that killed Chris Hondros.'”
In a Vanity Fair article he reiterated the story: “Tim was 40 years old when he died and had devoted most of his professional life to documenting the human cost of war. On April 20, in a bombed-out section of Misrata, a single mortar shell made him part of the cost. He was hit in the groin with shrapnel and bled out in the back of a pickup truck while Guillermo Cervera, a Spanish photojournalist he had just met, held his hand and tried to keep him awake. Hours earlier, amidst fierce shelling by Qaddafi forces, Tim had sent what was to be his last message on Twitter: In besieged Libyan city of Misurata. Indiscriminate shelling by Qaddafi forces. No sign of NATO.”
According to the Daily Mail, three more people were injured in the attack.
Arab Anger Revolution said that five more people were killed on that day in Misurata due to indiscriminate shelling.
The local time of the incident is unknown.
The victims were named as:
Geolocation notes
Reports of the incident mention the city of Misurata (مصراتة), for which the generic coordinates are: 32.374457, 15.087794. Due to limited satellite imagery and information available to Airwars, we were unable to verify the location further.
Summary
Sources (9) [ collapse]
Media
from sources (4) [ collapse]
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Tim Hetherington (via CBS)
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Chrin Hondros (via CBS)