Photographer Matt McDermott was still in bed when his mom called to say a plane had hit the World Trade Center — minutes later, he was chasing an NYPD cruiser on a borrowed motorcycle straight into the heart of hell. Battling smoke, panic, and total chaos, McDermott captured the haunting images that would define a generation — including the now-iconic shot of a firefighter kneeling on an axe in silent prayer. “Boom, boom, boom,” he says of the moment the second tower came down, as he kept shooting through the blackness. What started with instinct and adrenaline became the moment that made his career — and changed him forever.

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