There’s no use in mincing words: 2020 will go down as an exceptionally rough year. America’s photojournalists spent countless hours on the front line documenting fighting, disease, disaster and heartbreak — some human-made, others from forces of nature. Look back at some of the year’s most notable moments:
The year in pictures: 2020’s most noteworthy news photos
Nov. 7: People shoot off fireworks in D.C.’s Black Lives Matter Plaza while celebrating President-elect Joe Biden’s win over President Donald Trump to become the 46th president of the United States.
(AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
![Flooded roadway](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2020_09_10_US50_flood-e1611925047721.jpg)
Sept. 10: Flash flooding transforms a segment of U.S. Route 50 in Prince George’s County, Maryland, into a river after thunderstorms dumped several inches of rain in the region, submerging one of the D.C. metro area’s busiest roadways under 5 feet of brackish water and trapping drivers.
(WTOP/Dave Dildine)
![Police in riot gear.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2020-5-30-George-Floyd-328-1880x1254.jpg)
May 30: U.S. Park Police and Secret Service officers form a crowd control line through Lafayette Square during protests over the death of George Floyd. The historic park north of the White House has been barricaded off from the public for much of the year.
(WTOP/Alejandro Alvarez)
![Flames from a burning SUV.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2020-5-30-George-Floyd-405-1880x1254.jpg)
May 30: an SUV burns near the corner of I and 16th Street within a few blocks of the White House as protests over the death of George Floyd turn violent in D.C. and across the country. While protests remained peaceful for the remainder of the spring and much of the summer, two nights in late May ended with the rare deployment of tear gas in downtown D.C.
(WTOP/Alejandro Alvarez)
June 1: President Donald Trump holds a Bible as he stands outside St. John’s Church across Lafayette Square from the White House in D.C., after law enforcement officers used tear gas and other riot control tactics to forcefully clear peaceful protesters from the area.
(AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
Feb. 2: Sneakers and a Los Angeles Lakers jersey with the No. 8 worn by NBA star Kobe Bryant hang at a memorial for Bryant in Los Angeles, a week after he was killed in a helicopter crash.
(AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
May 28: A protester carries a U.S. flag upside-down as he walks past a burning building in Minneapolis, during a protest over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed a knee into his neck for several minutes.
(AP Photo/Julio Cortez)
April 26: In a scene reminiscent of post-apocalyptic fiction, lanes stood empty on the 110 Arroyo Seco Parkway that leads to downtown Los Angeles, after California entered lockdown in an early attempt to control the spread of the coronavirus.
(AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill)
May 15: Yasmine Protho, 18, wears a photo of herself and “Class of 2020” on her protective mask amid the COVID-19 virus outbreak as she graduates with only nine other classmates and limited family attending at Chattahoochee County High School in Cusseta, Georgia.
(AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)
July 3: President Donald Trump smiles during a visit to Mount Rushmore National Memorial near Keystone, South Dakota.
(AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Sept. 9: Embers light up a hillside behind the Bidwell Bar Bridge, as the Bear Fire burns in Oroville, Calif., in this photo taken with a slow shutter speed.
(AP Photo/Noah Berger)
![A horse drawn carriage crossing a bridge.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/GettyImages-1259068113-1-1880x1254.jpg)
July 26: A horse-drawn carriage carrying the body of civil rights icon, former U.S. Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), crosses the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. On March 7, 1965, Lewis and other civil rights leaders were attacked by Alabama State Police officers while marching across the bridge in support of voting rights for African Americans. The day would come to be known as “Bloody Sunday.”
(Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
![Masked members of the National Guard on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/GettyImages-1245141571-1880x1249.jpg)
June 2: Members of the D.C. National Guard stand on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial as demonstrators participate in a peaceful protest against police brutality and the death of George Floyd in D.C.
(Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
![Demonstrators cooling off in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/GettyImages-1269424198-1880x1254.jpg)
Aug. 28: Demonstrators Daria Allen and Tashi-Kali Acket cool off in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool during the Commitment March in D.C. The Rev. Al Sharpton and the National Action Network organized a march with families who lost loved ones to police brutality, calling for criminal justice reform and demanding changes to federal legislation against police misconduct.
(Photo by Natasha Moustache/Getty Images)
![Healthcare worker hugging patient.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/GettyImages-1229807339-1880x1254.jpg)
Nov. 26: Dr. Joseph Varon hugs and comforts a patient in the COVID-19 intensive care unit during Thanksgiving at the United Memorial Medical Center in Houston, Texas — when the state reached over 1,220,000 cases, including over 21,500 deaths.
(Photo by Go Nakamura/Getty Images)
![Man stands amid containers holding bodies at a funeral home.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/GettyImages-1220439276-1880x1254.jpg)
April 22: Omar Rodriguez organizes bodies in the Gerard Neufeld funeral home in the Elmhurst neighborhood of the Queens borough in New York City. The decades-old funeral home, that now primarily serves an immigrant community in Queens that has been hit hard by coronavirus, was overwhelmed by the number of deceased needing funeral services because of the virus.
(Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
![Crowd of masked voters.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/GettyImages-1229258611-1880x1254.jpg)
Oct. 24: People wait in a line to vote at Madison Square Garden during early voting for the U.S. presidential election in New York City. Due to the coronavirus and social distancing concerns, New York State allowed early voting for the first time.
(Photo by Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)
![Lighting above the U.S. Capitol Building.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2020_06_04_Capitol_Lightning5-e1616930219379.jpg)
June 4: Lightning fills the sky during a late spring thunderstorm over the nation’s capital in the midst of a turbulent week filled with unrelenting protests over the death of George Floyd. Two National Guard members were injured when lightning struck them at their posts within Lafayette Square, WTOP’s news partners at NBC Washington reported; both recovered.
(WTOP/Dave Dildine)
![Memorial in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2020-9-19-Honor-RBG-015-1880x1254.jpg)
Sept. 19: Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death shocked a nation holding its breath with mere months until a divisive election. News of her death brought thousands to the Supreme Court on short notice, where a makeshift vigil quickly accumulated bouquets, messages, pebbles and even action figures in honor of the late justice.
(WTOP/Alejandro Alvarez)
![Crowds in front of the White House.](https://wtop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/EZ3DmHKWsAkCqNg-1880x1254.jpg)
June 6: Tens of thousands of people fill 16th Street for miles in downtown D.C. from Scott Circle to the northern perimeter of Lafayette Square before the White House, in the summer’s single-largest peaceful demonstration over the aftermath of George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis.
(WTOP/Dave Dildine)