A red, white, and blue fighter jet banks over a blue sea crowded with motorboats and yachts, with faint vapor trails extending behind its wings.

Above the Gathering

MG-0442

2024-07-30

About this piece

A banking jet reveals its patterned underside above a gathering of boats, its angular silhouette set against an almost continuous field of blue. Fine wingtip trails and a distant yacht’s wake trace contrasting paths through air and water.

The story

I followed the jet as it banked above the boats, watching its wings turn almost upright against the blue. Below, the water held a scattered gathering of hulls, each small enough to make the aircraft’s passage feel immense. A yacht cut a pale line across the distance. I framed the moment around those different measures of movement: the sharp turn overhead, the long wake beyond, and the boats gathered beneath.

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