PRETORIA, December 31. /ITAR-TASS/. Famous camera operator Dudley Saunders was knocked down to death by a train while filming in South Africa. As reported by South African television, Saunders was preparing a story for the BBC about the most famous in the past black ghetto of the country — Soweto, which now has become a common area of Johannesburg, the country’s economic capital.
Circumstances of the incident are being investigated, but, apparently, the operator was so carried away by events in the frame that paid no attention to the approaching threat.
Saunders became famous in South Africa as one of the authors of popular local television programs "Special assignments" and "Carte Blanche". In 2011, his name emerged on the front pages of newspapers after extremist supporters of Julius Malem threw at the journalist with stones. Malem staged a demonstration outside Luthuli House, the headquarters of the ruling party in South Africa, African National Congress.
According to the most desperate South African TV journalist Deborah Patta, “filming scenes by Saunders has always been more than just a story — it was an adventure, artwork, sheer entertainment”.