Striking aerial photos show new views of San Francisco's shelter in place

An aerial drone view of an empty Lombard Street tourist destination during the coronavirus pandemic on March 30, 2020 in San Francisco, California. An aerial drone view of an empty Lombard Street tourist destination during the coronavirus pandemic on March 30, 2020 in San Francisco, California. Photo: Justin Sullivan, Getty Images Photo: Justin Sullivan, Getty Images Image 1 of / 25 Caption Close Striking aerial photos show new views of San Francisco's shelter in place 1 / 25 Back to Gallery

As most of San Francisco keeps a low profile during the coronavirus crisis — only occasionally emerging to buy groceries or to complete other essential tasks — life in the city presents itself in only tiny, fragmented slices.

When your daily routine is confined to a scant few blocks, it is impossible to take the full breadth of the pandemic's impact on the the streets and neighborhoods. But while everyone else is going to ground with a case of toilet paper and a three-week supply of organic mac and cheese, Justin Sullivan is taking to the air, sort of.

A staff photojournalist for Getty Images, Sullivan has been expanding his use of drones as a reporting tool to near daily usage. But flying a drone to capture stark moments of public-free public places is more complicated that it may seem.

"It's important to me to find something that's unique and different, and it takes a lot research," Sullivan said. "I spend my evenings just scouring every possible thing — looking at maps — just trying to figure out someway to approach it that's not going to be another photo of someone wearing a mask."

For photojournalists around the world, it has become more and more difficult to depict how COVID-19 has fundamentally changed daily life. Boarded-up businesses, pedestrians in masks, people in windows, and, increasingly, drone imagery define how the outside world sees S.F. in crisis mode.

"This is a great tool to show the enormity of this thing — and not have to pay thousands of dollars to charter a helicopter," Sullivan joked. "If this would have happened five years ago before drones were even part of our toolkit, how would show how widespread this is?"

Patterns on school yard tarmac, twisting off-ramps, empty streets and laid-up Muni trains provide a backdrop to the city's new shelter-at-home reality.

Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Geary Boulevard.

The emptiness of the city is striking to Sullivan, who has lived in the Bay Area since 1987. "The one that really sticks out to me, is the shot of Geary Boulevard going through in Japantown — I've never seen that ever," he said.

"It's just kind of surreal to be out with just a handful of people," he added. "There are people who are seem like they are just trying to go about their daily lives and I think that's virtually impossible at this point to have any semblance of what your life actually was three weeks ago."

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