Details of ‘that’ riot photograph emerge

The photographer behind the viral image of a woman plunging from a blazing building during the worst night of the London riots has spoken out about the shocking moment.

The dramatic image shows terrified pyjama-clad victim of arson Monika Konczyk, 32, leaping from a south London flat made the front pages of national newspapers and has been hailed as deserving a Pulitzer Prize.

Photographer Amy Weston was in Croydon on Monday night when she captured the moment the Miss Konczyk leaping from her flat window above a blazing furniture store and into the arms of police officers below.

According to the Daily Mail, the victim of the blaze is Polish and moved to England in March for a better life. She is apparently still too petrified to speak about the ordeal.

The photographer revealed how she risked her life to take the snap and that she had driven towards the crime-ridden Church Street area, near Surrey Street Market.

“By the time I drove towards it, I could already see the fires from my windscreen.There were six or seven people screaming and crying outside, and they looked like they lived at the flats that were burning. The flats were above small independent shops. A man in a white shirt was screaming that a girl was at the window and that she was ready to jump. He ran towards her but riot police had appeared and pulled him back, and they went to her instead.” Weston said.

Mattresses and carpets were reportedly placed underneath the window by riot police to break her fall.

Weston revealed: “As soon as she dropped, the crowds pushed back and there was no way to see what happened to her. I remember hearing people screaming that there were more people in the building. The crowds started getting angry with each other, with one group blaming another group for starting the fire.”

[Gallery: UK riots in pictures]

She then added that she had to escape from gas cylinders that were being fired into the crowd. Unable to return to her car, she walked away and avoided being mugged for her camera by wrapping it in a cloth.

Miss Konczyk apparently walked away unscathed after the fall.