That depends on what you think the images have captured. Why?

Certainly the pictures are uncanny, but they do pose a daunting challenge for the Urban Legend Zeitgeist. One of three possibilities holds:

• The pictures were doctored or were fakes.
• The pictures capture a phenomenon consistent with an ordinary physical explanation.
• The pictures capture the physical manifestation of a supernatural being.

The first possibility can be ruled out. The pictures come from the Associated Press and CNN. The Associated Press picture was taken by freelance photographer Mark D. Phillips. The Associated Press has denied any alteration or modification of its picture noting it has strict guidelines against the alteration of photographs.

As for the CNN picture, it was taken from a digital movie. Digital movies sacrifice a certain amount of resolution and picture clarity in order to fit within a reasonable size. Since the face does not appear in any other photograph, film or videotape of the event, and the picture is from the crash of the second plane into the World Trade Center and was well covered for a variety of sources and angles, the Urban Legend Zeitgeist concludes that the appearance of the face is due to the distortions of a digital movie. The Face on Mars is another example of an image due to digital manipulation rather than physical reality.

As for the second possibility, billowing smoke, lighting and different camera angles adequately explain the images.

The third possibility the Urban Legend Zeitgeist will leave to the theologians and philosophers. When?September 12, 2001 Comments

Of all the images the Urban Legend Zeitgeist has seen of the attacks, these pictures are not memorable or even particularly compelling. Many more troubling, unforgetable, heartbreaking images spring to our minds. See also

Web references:

• A Face in the Smoke? from KUSA TV Denver
• What is that image? from mlive.com and the Saginaw News