Sunday 25 December 2011

Top Viral Photos of 2011

Philippines’ giant crocodile



The Mayor of Agusan del Sur Province in Philippines poses   with a huge crocodile that was captured by residents and crocodile farm staff on Sunday, September 4, 2011. It took a three-week hunt by dozens of villagers and experts to ensnare the 21-foot male creature, one of the largest crocodile to be captured alive in the Philippines in recent years.

Cyclops shark


This unbelievable (yet real)  photo shows a one-eyed albino shark that was found off the coast of Isla Cerralvo near La Paz, Mexico, in June 2011. The image went viral after being posted on the blog of a local sportfishing company, which was forced to defend the photo after skeptics questioned its integrity. The company later published more pictures of the unique albino baby and discovered that a commercial fisherman had extracted it after catching a dead female bull shark with ten pups inside her.


Atlantis shuttle launch


The coolest photo of the space shuttle Atlantis launch wasn't taken by NASA but by high school graduate Ryan Graff, who snapped this picture from his window seat on a flight from Baltimore to Miami on July 8, 2011. The image quickly went viral once Ryan's brother, Chad, uploaded it to his Twitpic account, where it has received over 177,000 views.

Bubble lake



Landscape photographer Emmanuel Coupe was named 2011 National Geographic Traveler Photographer of the Year for this photo of a frozen lake in Canada.


Pepper spray at UC Davis


Public outrage emerged when police officers at University of California, Davis, used pepper spray to control Occupy UC Davis protesters who were seated in the school's quad on November 18, 2011. Video and photos of the controversial incident were quickly beamed around the Internet. In a comedic twist on a disturbing event, the man behind the pepper spray trigger, Lieutenant John Pike, became the face of an Internet meme that saw his image pasted into various famous scenes.

Lightning strikes Eiffel Tower
 

This amazing photo, taken from an apartment window in 2010, surfaced this year and won the Office du Tourisme de Paris competition. "I quickly grabbed my camera and put it on a tripod by the window," said the 31-year-old photographer who caught the moment the Eiffel Tower appeared to be struck by lightning.

Whale nearly swallows diver


This jaw-dropping image shows a diver almost being swallowed by a whale shark during a  feeding frenzy (thankfully, only plankton was on the menu). The photo was taken in Isla Mujeres, Mexico, where more than 600 of the 40-foot creatures converged to feed on tuna spawn.

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