Only the most intrepid urban explorers cross the tattered ruins of the old Iron Curtain to endure the excessive bureaucracy, military paranoia and freezing winds of the East to hunt for the ghosts of an empire. Rebecca Litchfield is one who couldn’t resist the haunting allure of the ruins of the Soviet Union.

A shrine maiden walks in the snow at the Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine in Kamakura, near Tokyo, Thursday, November 24, 2016. Tokyo residents have woken up to the first November snowfall in more than 50 years. An unusually cold air mass brought wet snow to Japan's capital on Thursday. Above-freezing temperatures kept the snow from sticking, but forecasters said there could be an accumulation of up to 2 centimeters (1 inch). The last time it snowed in central Tokyo in November was in 1962. (Photo by Shizuo Kambayashi/AP Photo)

Dr. Lisa Ballance (NOAA Fisheries Service) with a curious calf – this is a Type C killer whale, a fish-eater.

Three workers demonstrating the different types of gas masks used in mine rescue work. (Photo by Fox Photos/Getty Images). December 1925

Crowds wave as HMS Daring, the largest and most powerful destroyer warship ever built for the Royal Navy, leaves Portsmouth Harbour on January 11, 2012 in Portsmouth, England. HMS Daring, the first of six new Type 45 destroyers embarked from Portsmouth on its maiden deployment, a seven-month mission to the Middle East. (Photo by Matt Cardy/Getty Images)

Krastsvetmet, located beside the beautiful Yensei river in the metropolis of Krasnoyarsk, Russia, is a refinery of all types of precious metals on an industrial scale.

“Award-winning photographer Camille Seaman, best known for her earlier work depicting massive polar icebergs, recently turned her lens on another incredible natural phenomenon - storm clouds above the American Midwest. She partnered with experienced storm chasers and began to stalk a particular type of storm cloud – the supercell. On June 22, 2012, in western Nebraska, she encountered an enormous supercell and captured its many faces”. (Photo by Camille Seaman via TheAtlantic)