Ethiopia's Danakil Depression

Ethiopia's Danakil Depression

Salt Mountains of Dallol volcano in Ethiopia.

Ethiopia's Danakil salt pan can be seen in this aerial view near the Dallol volcano

A colorful feature of one of Danakil's hot springs.

A long exposure image shot beside the crater of Erta Ale, an active volcano in Danakil.

Erta Ale, a continuously active basaltic shield volcano in the Afar region of northeastern Ethiopia.

Lava formations in a secondary crater of Erta Ale

Ropy lava in a flow near Erta Ale crater.

The landscape of one of several hot springs in the Danakil Depression, photographed

A sulfur lake in the Danakil Depression

Colorful features of one of several hot springs in the Danakil Depression, in Ethiopia's Afar region

The area around Lake Dallol and its sulfur springs.

An Ethiopian man walks past a sulfur spring in the Danakil Depression

Mineral deposits near Dallol Volcano.

Broad fungus-like mineral deposits in the Danakil Depression.

Deposits on a cone, forming around a small geyser, in one of Danakil's hot springs.

Water sputters from the tip of a cone on a small geyser in one of Danakil's hot springs.

Reddish waters of Lake Karum, or "Assale," fill a seasonally dry shallow area after flooding, due to a recent storm

 in the surrounding highlands, in the Danakil Desert.

A salt flat is pictured in the Danakil Depression

A camel caravan, carrying salt that was mined by hand, is led across a salt plain in the Danakil Depression 

A camel caravan carries slabs of salt away from the Danakil Depression on April 22, 2013. 

The mineral is extracted and shaped into slabs, then loaded onto the animals before being transported back across 

the desert so that it can be sold around the country. 

A camel caravan enters the salt mining area of the Danakil Depression on March 28, 2017. 

Every morning, hundreds of men converge on a dry lakebed in a remote corner of Ethiopia, 

where they cleave the ground open with hand axes to extract salt, just as their fathers and grandfathers once did.