'Restrepo' director Tim Hetherington killed in Libya

Tim Hetherington while shooting his acclaimed documentary "Restrepo."

Tim Hetherington, co-director of the Oscar nominated documentary "Restrepo." was killed while covering the Libyan conflict today.  Another photojournalist, Chris Hondros, also died.  The Associated Press confirmed the news earlier today.

Details surrounding the 41-year-old Hetherington's death are unclear, but he was covering the conflict for the Panos photo agency and yesterday he tweeted "In besieged Libyan city of Misrata. Indiscriminate shelling by Qaddafi forces. No sign of NATO."

Hetherington was no stranger to dangerous environments.  He spent almost a decade covering the political conflicts and wars in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. During that time he was the cinematographer for the documentaries "Liberia: An Uncivil War" and "The Devil Came on Horseback."   He collaborated with Sebastian Junger to shoot "Restrepo" which chronicled a year with an American Army platoon in Afghanistan.  The picture was nominated for the Best Documentary Oscar this past January.  It won the same honor from the National Board of Review in Nov. of 2010 and the Grand Jury Prize, Documentary at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival.

Hondros was a Pulitzer prize nominated photographer who work had appeared in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Economist and Newsweek.  The New York Times reports that Hondros was working for Getty Images at the time and another photographer, Guy Martin, was in grave condition after also being wounded in the attack.

More updates on this story as they become available.

For more on Hetherington, you can watch HitFix's interview with him and Junger from July, 2010 below.