After 51 years with the Associated Press, Nick Ut says he will retire in March of next year, reports Ahn Do of the Los Angeles Times.
Ut, 66, is best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning 1972 photograph of a naked Vietnamese girl running in terror after being badly burned by napalm.
Today Ut is a fixture at many of Los Angeles’ biggest stories including the Michael Jackson, OJ Simpson and Night Stalker trials.
“I’m a lucky guy,” said Ut. “They knew my picture and they welcomed me. That picture gave me respect and allowed me to keep doing my job.”
His brother was also a photographer and was killed while covering the Vietnam War. That tragedy inspired Ut to pursue a career in photojournalism as well.
The napalm girl was later identified as Kim Phuc Phan. The two remain friends to this day. It was Ut who took her and some of the other children to the hospital before he ran back to AP to develop his photos.
Ut arrived in Los Angeles two years after the fall of Saigon in 1975.
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