Phan Thị Kim Phúc

Phan Thị Kim Phúc (; born April 6, 1963), referred to informally as the girl in the picture and the napalm girl, is a South Vietnamese-born Canadian woman best known as the child depicted in the Pulitzer Prize–winning photograph, titled '' The Terror of War'', taken at Trảng Bàng during the Vietnam War on June 8, 1972.

The image shows a nine-year-old Phúc running naked on a road after being severely burned on her back by a South Vietnamese Air Force napalm attack. The image became one of the most iconic and powerful symbols of the war, influencing global public opinion and anti-war movements.

After years of medical treatment for her injuries, Phúc eventually moved to Canada, where she became a citizen and later founded the Kim Foundation International, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping child victims of war. She has since become a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador and a prominent advocate for peace and reconciliation, frequently sharing her experiences to promote healing and understanding.

Her story has been widely documented in books, interviews, and documentaries, highlighting her journey from war victim to humanitarian. Despite enduring lifelong physical and emotional scars, Phúc continues to use her platform to support survivors of conflict and raise awareness about the humanitarian impact of war.

Vietnam War napalm attack

Phan Thi Kim Phúc and her family lived in Trảng Bàng in South Vietnam. On June 8, 1972, South Vietnamese planes dropped napalm on Trảng Bàng, which had been attacked and occupied by North Vietnamese forces. Phúc joined a group of civilians and South Vietnamese soldiers who were fleeing from the Caodai Temple to the safety of South Vietnamese-held positions. The Republic of Vietnam Air Force pilot flying an A-1E Skyraider mistook the group for enemy soldiers and diverted to attack. The bombing killed two of Phúc's cousins and two other villagers. Phúc received third degree burns after her clothing was burned by the fire.

Images and rescue

Photographer Nick Ut sold the Associated Press (AP) a photograph of Phúc running naked amid other fleeing villagers, South Vietnamese soldiers, and other press photographers. Ut was attributed as the photographer, but this has been contested without clear resolution since the release of ''The Stringer'' in 2025. In an interview many years later, Phúc recalled she was yelling, ''Nóng quá, nóng quá'' ("So hot, so hot") in the picture. ''The New York Times'' editors were at first hesitant to consider the photo for publication because of the nudity, but they eventually approved it. A cropped version of the photo—with the press photographers to the right removed—was featured on the front page of ''The New York Times'' the next day. Titled ''The Terror of War'', it later earned a Pulitzer Prize and was chosen as the World Press Photo of the Year for 1973.

Ut took Phúc and the other injured children to Barsky Hospital in Saigon, where it was determined that her burns were so severe that she probably would not survive. However, after a 14-month hospital stay and 17 surgical procedures, including skin grafts, she was able to return home. A number of the early operations were performed by Finnish plastic surgeon . It was only after treatment at a special hospital in Ludwigshafen, West Germany, in 1982, that Phúc was able to properly move again. Ut continued to visit Phúc until he was evacuated to the United States during the fall of Saigon.

Less publicized is the film, shot by British television cameraman Alan Downes for the British Independent Television News (ITN) and his Vietnamese counterpart Le Phuc Dinh, who was working for the American television network NBC, which shows the events just before and after the photograph was taken. In the top-left frame, a man stands and appears to take photographs as a passing airplane drops bombs. A group of children, Phúc among them, run away in fear. After a few seconds, she encounters the reporters dressed in military fatigues, including Christopher Wain (top-right frame), who gave her water and poured some over her burns. As she turns sideways, the severity of the burns on her arm and back can be seen (bottom-left frame). A crying woman, Phúc's grandmother, Tao, runs in the opposite direction holding her badly burned grandchild, 3-year-old Danh, Phúc's cousin, who died of his injuries (bottom-right frame). Sections of the film shot were included in '' Hearts and Minds'' (1974), the Academy Award-winning documentary about the Vietnam War directed by Peter Davis.

Adult life

In 1982, Phúc was removed from her university as a young adult studying medicine and used as a propaganda symbol by the communist government of Vietnam. Due to constant pain, she considered suicide, but later that year she found a New Testament in a library that led her to become a Christian and towards forgiveness. In 1986, she was granted permission to continue her studies in Cuba, where she learned Spanish and was trained as a pharmacist. Phúc met Ut for the first time in fourteen years in Havana

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