{"id":294991,"date":"2026-02-21T09:59:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T09:59:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/294991\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T09:59:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T09:59:12","slug":"photographer-describes-capturing-viral-andrew-photo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/294991\/","title":{"rendered":"Photographer describes capturing viral Andrew photo"},"content":{"rendered":"

The picture of a stunned Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor slouched in the back of a car following his arrest<\/a> has been splashed across newspapers and websites around the world.<\/p>\n

The photograph was taken by Reuters photographer Phil Noble, who said capturing the moment was “more luck than judgement”.<\/p>\n

Andrew, who was stripped of his royal titles<\/a> last year because of his links to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, was arrested Thursday (local time) on suspicion of misconduct<\/a> in public office. <\/p>\n

He was later taken to a Norfolk police station for questioning on what was his 66th birthday and was “released under investigation” after being held in custody for nearly 11 hours. <\/p>\n

When news of Andrew’s arrest broke, Noble drove around six hours from his home in Manchester to Norfolk, describing it as “a proper old school news day”.<\/p>\n

“It\u2019s a guy being arrested \u2014 who can we call, tracking him down,” Noble told Reuters.<\/p>\n

\"Reuters<\/p>\n

Reuters photographer Phil Noble captured the viral image of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s arrest. (Source: Reuters)<\/p>\n

After receiving a tip-off, Noble headed to the market town of Aylsham, more than an hour from Andrew’s residence. <\/p>\n

Several other media crews were waiting outside, but Noble said as hours passed and night fell, it appeared the information may have been wrong. <\/p>\n

Noble packed up and began heading back to his hotel when he received a call from a Reuters colleague saying two cars had arrived at the police station, and suggested he turn back. <\/p>\n

Within a minute of arriving back, the two vehicles began leaving the police station at high speed. <\/p>\n

Noble said the front car contained police officers, so he aimed his camera at the car behind, unsure of where Andrew might have been sitting. <\/p>\n

“When you’re photographing moving parts, it\u2019s hit and miss,” he said. “You\u2019ve got to guess where he’s sitting, ‘is he in the front, is he in the back?'” <\/p>\n

He captured six frames \u2014 two showed police officers, two were blank, and one was out of focus. The final shot was clear, showing a shocked Andrew-Mountbatten Windsor leaning back in his seat. <\/p>\n

“I couldn\u2019t believe I\u2019d got him as well as I did,\u201d Noble said, and asked his colleague to verify if it was Andrew in the photo. <\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The final shot showed a shocked Andrew-Mountbatten Windsor leaning back in his seat. (Source: Reuters)<\/p>\n

“The photo gods were on my side yesterday.”<\/p>\n

The picture quickly became the defining image of Andrew’s arrest and circulated around media outlets worldwide<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Noble said while it may not be the best photo he has ever taken, it ranked among the most important. <\/p>\n

“You can plan and use your experience, but everything still needs to align,” he said. <\/p>\n

“In a climate where photographers are everywhere, it\u2019s rare for one outlet to get one key moment like that. It\u2019s a bit surreal, to be honest.” <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The picture of a stunned Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor slouched in the back of a car following his arrest has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":294992,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,1073,43,6747,40,38,41,39,1745],"class_list":["post-294991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-media","tag-news","tag-royalty","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-uk-europe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294991\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/294992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}