Hubert van Es

Hubert van Es (6 July 1941 – 15 May 2009) was a Dutch photographer and photojournalist who took the well-known photo on 29 April 1975, which shows South Vietnamese civilians scrambling to board a CIA Air America helicopter during the U.S. evacuation of Saigon. The picture was taken a day before the Fall of Saigon.

Van Es was variously known in his working life as "Hu", the anglicized "Hugh" and the nickname "Vanes", to rhyme with "planes".

Early life Hubert van Es was born in Hilversum, the Netherlands. He moved to Hong Kong in 1967, where he initially worked as a freelancer, before joining the South China Morning Post as chief photographer.

Career in Vietnam

Hubert van Es went to Vietnam in 1968, where he worked for NBC News as a sound man. He later joined the Associated Press photo staff in Saigon from 1969 to 1972 and then covered the last three years of the Vietnam War, from 1972 to 1975, for United Press International (UPI).

When North Vietnamese troops arrived, Van Es wore a camouflage hat bearing a small plastic Dutch flag printed with the Vietnamese words Báo chí Hà Lan ("Dutch Press").

The building in the photo, which has been incorrectly identified as the US Embassy, Saigon since the 1970s, was not labelled as such by Van Es. He has stated that he wrote, for the caption of his photograph, that the helicopter was taking evacuees off the roof of a CIA building in Saigon (22 Gia Long Street). Although van Es attempted to have the caption corrected, his efforts proved futile and he eventually gave up. The location's current address is Trọng Street (named after Lý Tự Trọng, a 17-year-old communist executed by the French) and visitors are allowed access to the roof by taking the elevator to the 9th floor.

Later career Van Es covered the insurgency in the Philippines and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. He attempted to return to Vietnam but was not able to do so until 1990. Upon his return to Vietnam, while visiting the countryside, he was quoted as remarking: "It [Vietnam] hasn't really changed since I was last here; but our photos changed the views of those who were lucky enough not to witness this terrible war."

Death On 15 May 2009, Van Es died in Queen Mary Hospital, Hong Kong, at the age of 67 from a haemorrhagic stroke. He had lived in Hong Kong since the end of the Vietnam War.