Photograph, Print
Juana Lomi, Paramedic, NYU Downtown Hospital
- Description
- Life-sized Polaroid photograph taken by Joe McNally depicting paramedic Juana Lomi. Lomi is wearing her blue uniform with her medical trauma kit at her feet and her credentials and stethoscope around her neck.
- Historical Notes
- Among the first on scene at the World Trade Center was paramedic Juana Lomi. Standing outside NYU Downtown Hospital, Lomi witnessed the passage of hijacked Flight 11 flying low overhead and felt the ground rumble as the plane struck the North Tower. Lomi and her partner immediately drove to the scene and parked their ambulance near the North Tower.
Inside the ambulance was a red emergency trauma kit, stocked with the supplies needed to treat the injured. Separately, after hearing that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center, MetroCare EMT Yamel Josefina Merino and her partner drove downtown from the Bronx in their ambulance. They reported to a triage area near the South Tower, which had been struck by another hijacked airplane by the time they arrived on scene.
As the streets filled with debris, Lomi, Merino, and their partners assisted the injured, the traumatized, and those attempting to flee the escalating disaster. Merino was killed in the collapse of the South Tower. Lomi heard the building collapsing from her post near the North Tower. She remained on duty, finding shelter when the North Tower fell. Lomi summarized her experience in a caption accompanying her picture in McNally’s Faces of Ground Zero: “It was an overwhelming feeling of fear, horror—and not being able to do more. There were hundreds of people that needed to be treated. I was at risk of losing my life, but I had to stay and help other people.”
Lomi has contributed her story to the 9/11 Memorial Museum’s oral history collection. The red trauma kit she likely used on 9/11 was also donated to the Museum's collection.
Curator's Comment
In the weeks after September 11, LIFE Magazine photographer Joe McNally (b. 1952) invited rescuers, recovery workers, survivors, and bereaved family members to a studio in Manhattan’s Bowery district, not far from Ground Zero. Here, the participants were memorialized by a unique Polaroid camera—dubbed the Moby C—equipped with a lens from a U-2 spy plane. This room-sized instrument could capture an exposure of singular clarity on an eight-foot tall piece of film in the blackened studio. Each 90-second session required meticulous staging and absolute stillness. Whereas most photographers were concentrating on documenting the devastation of the attacks downtown, McNally was interested in recording the heroism and sorrow etched into the human faces at the center of this national tragedy. Those who faced the camera were mostly everyday people who sought no special recognition. “They came only with the intention of participating in a project, telling their story, and sharing in the telling of others,” McNally reflected.
The 9/11 Memorial Museum has enjoyed a long relationship with McNally's images. In 2006, McNally donated his portrait of FDNY Ladder 20 firefighter Adrienne Walsh to support the Museum’s nascent permanent collection. When the outdoor Memorial opened to the public in 2011, a selection from the series was borrowed from the photographer and rotated onto view in the temporary Visitor Center at 90 West Street. Annual acquisitions from the Faces of Ground Zero archive have continued, often as gifts arranged by McNally. In 2017, the Museum assumed custody of the remaining Polaroids in an agreement that will result in the collection’s completed donation by 2027.
The image in this record is the product of a color transparency from a Mamiya RZ 6x7 Pro II 120 format camera that McNally positioned to record a shot simultaneous with the Polaroid Moby C’s flash of light. The unique, original Polaroid exhibits a more subtle and creamier tonality.
The 9/11 Memorial Museum has enjoyed a long relationship with McNally's images. In 2006, McNally donated his portrait of FDNY Ladder 20 firefighter Adrienne Walsh to support the Museum’s nascent permanent collection. When the outdoor Memorial opened to the public in 2011, a selection from the series was borrowed from the photographer and rotated onto view in the temporary Visitor Center at 90 West Street. Annual acquisitions from the Faces of Ground Zero archive have continued, often as gifts arranged by McNally. In 2017, the Museum assumed custody of the remaining Polaroids in an agreement that will result in the collection’s completed donation by 2027.
The image in this record is the product of a color transparency from a Mamiya RZ 6x7 Pro II 120 format camera that McNally positioned to record a shot simultaneous with the Polaroid Moby C’s flash of light. The unique, original Polaroid exhibits a more subtle and creamier tonality.
- Accession Number: C.2013.644.7
- Dimensions: 109 in X 44 in X 0.08 in
- Dimensions (Metric): 276.86 cm X 111.76 cm X 0.2032 cm
- Source: Joseph McNally
- Credit Line: Gift of Joe McNally in thanks for ADORAMA's ongoing generous support of the Faces of Ground Zero Collection and of the "Faces of Ground Zero - 10 Years Later" Exhibit, 2011. Courtesy, Ellen Price, Inc. © Joe McNally.
First RespondersHospitalsMedical Professionals ParamedicsPhotographer and Videographer: Professional
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