A Year So Uncommon: 2020 in Pictures

Certain years of human evoltion would go down as the most eventful in its history. The year 1760 for the Industrial Revolution, 1939 for the World War 2, 1993 for the advent of the World Wide Web and 2020 for the year in which humanity itself faced  extraordinary tests. As the fateful year comes to its end, we at checkbrand.online have selected eleven most impactful images from all across the globe based on trends and our analysis which would collectively represent one of the most challenging years mankind has ever faced.
 

1. Inception of the Pandemic in Wuhan:

Captured by the AFP Staff Photojournalist Hector Retamal, this photograph shows officials wearing protective suits checking on a man who collapsed and died on the street near the hospital. The COVID-19 virus  devastated the city of Wuhan and gradually made its way across the borders. It would go on to infect over 76 million people worldwide and cause a global lockdown.

2. Bushfire Crisis, Australia:

This image (credit :The Atlantic) was taken during the Australian Bushfires which  burned more than 46 million acres of land, 3,500 homes and caused 34 human casualties. It is estimated than more than a billion animals persihed from the bushfire. Australia’s government found that 471 plants and 191 invertebrates were affected by the fires, with the most severely affected species losing at least 30% of their habitat.
 

3. Democratic Development in Hong Kong
 

The Hong Kong Protests (image: New York Times) also known as Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill Movement, were triggered by the introduction of the Fugitive Offenders amendment bill by the Hong Kong government. The new bill would have allowed extradition to jurisdictions with which Hong Kong did not have extradition agreements, including mainland China and Taiwan. This triggered a fear that the Chinese would it to curb dissent in Hong Kong.

4. Global Lockdown Imposed:

For the first time this geneartion has ever witnessed, a global lockdown was imposed to curb the spread of the novel Coronavirus. International flights were halted, trade suffered and the world came to a complete stanstill. However, the lockdown proved to be beneficial for the environment which seemed to begin thriving with a lesser human intervention. Above picture (image: twitter) shows a monkey walk past the Rajpath as the national capital of India went into a complete lockdown after the nationwide declaration by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
 

5. Migrant Migration, India:

With factories shut down due to the lockdown, the migrants in India headed back home (image credit: twitter) on a long and arduous journey on foot as transportation services ceased to operate. More than 300 migrant workers died due to the lockdown, with reasons ranging from starvation, suicides, exhaustion, road and rail accidents, police brutality and denial of timely medical care. Later in the month of May, the world was exalted by the news of a 15-year-old girl who carried her ailing father on a bicycle for 1,200 kilometres from Bihar to Gurugram over the course of a week. She was later approached by the Cycling Federation of India and received praise from Ivanka Trump

6. Quarantine Centres: a reality

The Coronavirus spread and mutated at a galloping speed which forced governments to create quarantine centres (image credit: Reuters, India) and dedicated hospitals. However, many reports of people fleeing quarantine centres, struggling with unhygienic rooms and food, living in cramped spaces and being treated as untouchables began to surface. The pandemic pushed the limits of human endurance and countries like India became the global hotspot.
 

7. The Corona Helmet, Chennai:

In a bid to spread the awareness about the coronavirus, an artist collaborated with the Chennai Police to make a 'Corona Helmet' (image credit: Google), to discourage people from venturing out unnecessarily. Police played a critical role in maintaining adherance to the rules of the lockdown. 

8. George Floyd Protests, USA:

Civil unrest and protests (image credit: Reuters)  began in the USA as a part of responses to the death of  George Floyd, a 46-year-old African-American man who was killed during an arrest after Derek Chauvin, a Minneapolis Police Department officer, knelt on Floyd's neck for nearly eight minutes as three other officers looked on and prevented onlookers from intervening. The issue re-ignited the issue of racism in the oldest democratic nation in the world and 'Black Lives Matter' became a global trend.

9. Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict:

Captured by Aris Messinis for AFP, Arthur Sahakyan, 63, prays inside the damaged Ghazanchetsots Cathedral that was hit during the fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The ethnic and territorial conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh led to over 6000 human casualties and many civilians being displaced.

10. The Biblical Locust Plague:

The outbreak of desert locust infestations (image credit: Google) is the worst in 70 years in Kenya and the worst in 25 years in Ethiopia, Somalia and India. The plague began in June 2019 and continued into 2020. In May, amid the coronavirus pandemic, parts of India such as Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh were severely affected by locust swarms measuring a kilometer wide, the worst locust attack in 27 years.
 

11. The Corona Warriors:

The segment would be incomplete without the mention of the Super Heroes of 2020: the Corona Warriors who were like soldiers deployed on the front without weapons. Doctors, Janitors, Policemen and many others got together to ensure the survival of human race. Checkbrand.online acknowledges and respects the services rendered by them. If there was one thing which this fateful year taught it, it was that alone we can do so little, together we can do so much !
 

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