Fires, crime scenes, SWAT standoffs, traffic-strangling accidents — you name it, John Spink has covered it. The award-winning visual journalist is synonymous with the breaking news beat. He has a reputation in the newsroom — and among some emergency personnel — of being everywhere at once. It’s not a case of just chasing news.

For Spink, it’s reflecting the drama, humor and humanity of the situation — the suspects, the police, the firefighters and even grieving families. With more than 40 years of covering fires, in particular, he’s seen his share of grief. “The last thing I want to happen in the paper is for folks to read about fire deaths as a statistic,” he said in an AJC documentary “Into the Fire.” “I’d rather put them there in the photos to allow them to really get a sense of this was somebody’s mother, this was somebody’s father, this was somebody’s child that passed. How would you feel?”

Spink joined the AJC staff in 1984 and has photographed a variety of news stories and sports, including the AJC’s Super Bowl coverage in Houston and Atlanta and the Braves World Series celebration.

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Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D. (center) is flanked by GOP whip Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo. (left) and Finance Committee Chairman Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, as Thune speak to reporters at the Capitol in Washington on Tuesday, July 1, 2025. Earlier Tuesday, the Senate passed the budget reconciliation package of President Donald Trump's signature bill of big tax breaks and spending cuts. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)

Credit: AP