Waves crashing on the shore at sunrise at St Mary's lighthouse in Whitley Bay in Tyne and Wear on the north east coast of England on Friday, October 22, 2021. (Photo by Owen Humphreys/PA Images via Getty Images)

There were huge thunder and lightening stroms in the South of England last night. Photographer Jamie Russell captured a stuning lightening striking the sea at Freshwater Bay on the Isle of Wight on September 6, 2022. (Photo by Jamie Russell/Bournemouth News)

A puffadder snake is guided to safety as firefighters battle a wildfire near Pringle Bay, as firefighters remain on high alert amid dry, hot, and windy weather in Western Cape, South Africa on January 30, 2024. (Photo by Esa Alexander/Reuters)

Cuban-American artist Jorge Rodriguez-Gerada's six-acre sand and soil “facescape” stretches across the JFK Hockey Field on the north side of the Reflecting Pool along the National Mall October 1, 2014 in Washington, DC. Titled “Out of Many, One” and composed of 2,500 tons of sand, 800 tons of top soil and eight miles of string, the piece is the artist's interpreative blending of 30 different men's faces. Rodriguez-Gereda used high-precision global positioning satellites to place 10,000 wood pegs as waypoints for the giant face. The piece will be open to the public beginning October 4 and will eventually be tilled back into the earth. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

More than 400 people stripped off and ran into freezing waters to celebrate the autumn equinox – and raise money for charity at Druridge Bay, Britain, September 25, 2016. It was the largest turnout the North East Skinny Dip has ever seen in its five-year history, and it was also the first time it has ever rained on the morning of the event. Revellers gathered from 5.30am on Sunday at Druridge Bay, in Northumberland, before baring all in the North Sea. (Photo by David Charlton Photography)

A seal playfully tries to bite the camera, taken on February 2016 in Plettenberg Bay, South Africa. A group of friendly seals get up close and personal with the camera. The pod of brown fur seals, also known as “cape fur seals”, were shot in Plettenberg Bay in South Africa by dive tour operator Rainer Schimpf. The playful creatures prove they are not camera shy in the slightest as they they swim upside down, grin widely and attempt to bite the camera lens. (Photo by Rainer Schimpf/Barcroft Media)

Merit: A Night at Deadvlei. The night before returning to Windhoek, we spent several hours at Deadveli. The moon was bright enough to illuminate the sand dunes in the distance, but the skies were still dark enough to clearly see the milky way and magellanic clouds. Deadveli means “dead marsh. The camelthorn trees are believed to be about 900 years old, but have not decomposed because the environment is so dry. (Photo and caption by Beth McCarley/National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest)