It took several firefighters and hundreds of litres of water to tame the blaze that engulfed a recycling factory in Hal Far on April 28. The thick black smoke was visible from afar and is what prompted Jonathan Borg to choose this as one of his favourite news pictures of the year. He says he had never before seen so much smoke.
October 16, 2017: Malta Armed Forces Brigadier Jeffrey Curmi and another man lift a white sheet where journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia was killed near her house in Bidnija. That day, at 3.10pm, the newsroom received a call that a car was on fire in Bidnija. Photographer Mark Zammit Cordina was assigned to cover it, and from the Mosta area he could see fire engines, ambulances and police cars. Not happy with his location, he made his way around Mġarr to get to a better vantage point and started taking pictures and video. It was only later that he received information about who had been inside the car when the bomb went off.
Last Wednesday night, a private jet tore loose from its chocks, broke through a perimeter fence, crossed a road outside the apron at Luqa airport and crashed into a building, probably propelled by strong winds. Photographer Jonathan Borg was at the scene first thing the following morning. Besides taking a dramatic photo of the plane’s nose from inside the building (which appeared in the Times of Malta on Friday) he chose this as one of his favourite photos of the year purely because of how unusual it is to see cyclists strolling casually under the fuselage of a plane.
This picture was taken during a sit-down protest outside the Police Headquarters in Floriana following the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia in October. As the adults around him demand justice, this little boy innocently throws a paper plane bearing a message to the Police Commissioner through the fence right in front of a police officer – who did not bat an eyelid, observed photographer Matthew Mirabelli
One of Matthew Mirabelli’s favourite shots of the year is this photo of Marlene and Godfrey Farrugia, who are partners and who both left the Labour Party for the Partit Demokratiku. They are engrossed in their mobile phones at the counting hall in Naxxar as history plays out around them, a moment laden with the potential to become a turning point for Maltese politics.
Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and Opposition Leader Simon Busuttil chat during the Sette Giugno ceremony in Valletta, right after the June general election. Thinking this was to be just another commemorative event, photographer Mark Zammit Cordina moved in closer to take pictures from a different angle. He likes the way his photo shows that “politicians are still human” and can share a joke, even the protagonists of such a divisive electoral campaign.
A couple snatched a kiss near works to upgrade the square outside City Gate, Valletta, and to restore the Triton Foundation. Chris Sant Fournier was amused by the image of a couple behaving as if they were in the middle of a holiday paradise, so absorbed in each other that they are oblivious to the noise and intense activity going on in the construction site right behind them.
An iconic image from the June election campaign: then Opposition leader Simon Busuttil is joined on stage by his partner, Kristina Chetcuti, after a mass meeting in Żebbuġ. Chris Sant Fournier says he chose this picture as one of his favourites because it perfectly captured the mood of the moment.