2009 in photos (part 1 of 3)

The year 2009 is now coming to a close, and it's time to take a look back over the past 12 months through photographs. Historic elections were held in Iran, India and the United States, some wars wound down while others escalated, China turned 60, and the Berlin Wall was remembered 20 years after it came down. Each photo tells its own tale, weaving together into the larger story of 2009. This is a multi-entry story, 120 photographs over three days. Please watch 2009 in photos (part 2 of 3) & 2009 in photos (part 3 of 3)
3 A group of Common Cranes gather in dawn light, on their night-roost on a lake in the German state of Brandenburg, close to Berlin September 26,
2009. From September to November tens of thousands of Cranes use the rural area close to the German Capital for a stopover during their migration from Scandinavia and Eastern Europe to their wintering quarters in Spain. (REUTERS/Thomas Krumenacker) #


4 Soldiers from the U.S. Army First Battalion, 26th Infantry take defensive positions at firebase Restrepo after receiving fire from Taliban
positions in the Korengal Valley of Afghanistan's Kunar Province, in this May 11, 2009 file photo. Spc. Zachery Boyd of Fort Worth, TX, far left was wearing "I love NY" boxer shorts after rushing from his sleeping quarters to join his fellow platoon members. From far right is Spc. Cecil Montgomery of Many, LA and Jordan Custer of Spokane, WA, center. (AP Photo/David Guttenfelder) #


5 Airline passengers wait to be rescued on the wings of a US Airways Airbus 320 jetliner that safely ditched in the frigid waters of the Hudson River
in New York, after a flock of birds knocked out both its engines on January 15, 2009. (AP Photo/Steven Day, File) #


6 A student receives a H1N1 vaccine injection at a hospital in Suining, Sichuan province November 11, 2009. (REUTERS/Stringer) #


7 A Iranian riot-police officer sprays tear-gas at a supporter of defeated Iranian presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi attacking him with a
police stick during riots in Tehran on June 13, 2009. (OLIVIER LABAN-MATTEI/AFP/Getty Images) #


8 A frame grab from YouTube shows a woman identified as Neda Agha-Soltan lying on the ground after being shot in the chest in Tehran, Iran June 20, 2009. Iranians on social networking sites called for mourning for "Neda", a young woman shot dead on Saturday. (REUTERS/YouTube) #


9 Fishermen row a boat in the algae-filled Chaohu Lake in Hefei, Anhui province, China on June 19, 2009. China invested 51 billion yuan ($7.4 billion) towards the construction of 2,712 projects for the treatment of eight rivers and lakes in 2009, Xinhua News Agency reported.(REUTERS/Jianan Yu) #


10 The moon passes between the sun and the earth, nearing a total solar eclipse, as seen in Changsha, Hunan province, China on July 22, 2009.
(REUTERS/Stringer) #


12 A cone of moisture surrounds part of the Ares I-X rocket during lift off Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2009, on a sub-orbital test flight from the Kennedy
Space Center's Launch Pad 39-B in Cape Canaveral, Fla. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara) #


13 Riot police contain supporters of Mozambique's national soccer team after their World Cup 2010 qualifying soccer match against Kenya in Maputo, September 6, 2009. (REUTERS/Grant Lee Neuenburg) #


14 Chicago White Sox pitcher Scott Linebrink delivers a pitch against the Chicago Cubs during the fifth inning of a spring training baseball game in Las Vegas, in this March 5, 2009 photo. (AP Photo/Isaac Brekken, File) #


15 A man walks his dog through Observatory Hill near Sydney on September 23, 2009 as Australia's biggest city is shrouded in an eerie blanket of red dust. Sydney's cars and buildings turned orange as strong winds blew desert dust across the city, snarling commuter and air transport and
prompting a warning for children and the elderly to stay indoors. (GREG WOOD/AFP/Getty Images) #

17 Brazilian Formula One driver Felipe Massa of Scuderia Ferrari is carried from his car after being struck in the head by a piece of bodywork that fell from another car during the qualifying session at the Hungaroring race track in Mogyorod near Budapest on July 25, 2009. Massa was airlifted
to hospital and underwent surgery on his fractured skull. (TAMAS KOVACS/AFP/Getty Images) #


18 French aerobatic team "Cartouche Dore" flies in formation near Aix-en-Provence, southern France. (JOEL SAGET/AFP/Getty Images) #


19 The sun shines on the skin of a hippo in its enclosure in the Zoo in Berlin, Friday, April 3, 2009. (AP Photo/Franka Bruns) 12natural #


20 AP photographer Emilio Morenatti takes pictures as he is carried on a stretcher out of the University of Maryland Medical Center's R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center to be transferred to the Kernan Orthopaedics and Rehabilitation Hospital in Baltimore, Tuesday Aug. 25, 2009.
Morenatti, whose left foot was amputated after a bomb blast in Afghanistan, was transferred Tuesday to a rehabilitation hospital in Baltimore, where he will be fitted for a prosthesis. (AP Photo/Enric Marti) #


21 A rescuer holding a two-year-old child tries to close a window on the girl's suicidal father who is trying to jump from the eighth floor of an apartment block in Chengdu, Sichuan province, July 7, 2009. Rescuers managed to distract the man while another snatched the girl and brought
her to safety. The man, who later tested positive for drugs, was arrested and taken into custody, according to China Daily. (REUTERS/China Daily) #


22 Blood and bullet holes are seen on a car door after an unidentified man was murdered in Tijuana, northern Mexico, Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2009. (AP Photo/Guillermo Arias) #


23 Demonstrators charge through a street in London during protests to coincide with Thursday's G20 summit meeting April 1, 2009. Demonstrators clashed with riot police and smashed bank windows in Britain's financial centre on Wednesday ahead of a G20 meeting in protest against a system they said had robbed the poor to benefit the rich. (REUTERS/Dylan Martinez) #


24 Australian surfer Mark Visser surfs an 11 m (36 ft) wave at Cow Bombie, near the West Australian town of Gracetown, 280km (174 mi) south of Perth, Australia in this photograph obtained September 28, 2009. The organisers claim that Visser had caught one of the biggest waves in
Australia for 2009. (REUTERS/Calum Macauley/Handout) #


25 Rows of 7.62 mm bullets are shown, ready to be shot by Afghan National Army recruits as part of their daily training at the Kabul Military Training Center in Kabul, Afghanistan on July 19, 2009. A massive effort is underway to train thousands of new troops to join the fight against the
vicious Taliban-led insurgency. But the task is hobbled by the lack of mentors and high levels of illiteracy among the recruits. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti) #

27 Residents stand on electric wires to stay on high ground while others wade in neck-deep flood waters caused by Typhoon Ondoy in Cainta Rizal, east of Manila September 27, 2009. (REUTERS/Erik de Castro) #


28 A Dog belonging to Rhonda O'Hearn of Sandown, New Hampshire waits before the start of a 60-mile race at the Can-Am Crown sled dog races in Fort Kent, Maine on Saturday, February 28, 2009. (Yoon S. Byun/Globe Staff) #


30 Handout picture released June 8, 2009 by the Brazilian Navy showing divers recovering a huge part of the rudder of the Air France A330 aircraft
lost in midflight over the Atlantic ocean June 1st. At the time, seventeen bodies had been recovered from the Atlantic where an Air France jet came down. (AFP/Getty Images) #


31 A Pakistani displaced boy from Swat valley sleeps under a mosquito net outside his tent at the Jalozai refugee camp near Peshawar, Pakistan,
Tuesday, May 26, 2009. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti) #

32 Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) sailors march pass Tiananmen Square during the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1, 2009 in Beijing, China. (Feng Li/Getty Images) #


33 The body of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) leader Vellupillai Prabhakaran is carried on a stretcher through a group of Sri Lankan
soldiers at Nanthikadal lagoon, near the town of Mullaittivu in northern Sri Lanka May 19, 2009. Sri Lanka's army chief said Tamil Tiger leader Prabhakaran's body was found on Tuesday, and Sri Lankan TV stations aired video of what appeared to be his corpse, with the top of its head blown off. (REUTERS/Stringer) #


34 An explosion is seen as missiles fired from an Israeli aircraft fall towards a target in the northern Gaza Strip, as seen from the Israeli
side of the border, Thursday, Jan. 1, 2009. (AP Photo/Gil Nechushtan) #


35 A mental patient named Totok reacts as he is given a shower at the Galuh foundation house in East Bekasi, outskirt of Jakarta, Indonesia on
October 23, 2009. The Galuh foundation house has housed more than 285 underprivileged mental patients since it was founded in 1982 by Gendu
Mulatip. (REUTERS/Beawiharta) #


36 A recently constructed section of the controversial US-Mexico border fence expansion project crosses previously pristine desert sands at
sunrise on March 14, 2009 between Yuma, Arizona and Calexico, California. The new barrier between the US and Mexico stands 15 feet tall and sits on top of the sand so it can lifted by a machine and repositioned whenever the migrating desert dunes begin to bury it. The almost seven miles of floating fence cost about $6 million per mile to build. (David McNew/Getty Images) #


37 Military and forensic experts inspect the body of a man who was killed outside a nightclub in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico on August 31, 2009. A man was handcuffed to a fence and shot several times by drug hitmen outside a nightclub, according to local media. The assailants
also left a warning message, known as "narco mensaje", at the site of the shooting. (REUTERS/Alejandro Bringas) #


38 A view taken from the International Space Station of the Sarychev Volcano on the Kuril Islands in an early stage of eruption on June 12, 2009.
(AFP/Getty Images/NASA) #



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