A driver maneuvers his classic American car along a wet road as a wave crashes against the Malecon in Havana, Cuba on Thursday. Hurricane Sandy blasted across eastern Cuba as a potent Category 2 storm and headed for the Bahamas after causing at least two deaths in the Caribbean. (Photo by Ramon Espinosa/Associated Press)

Skeleton involves a person riding a small sled down a frozen track while lying face down. The sport is a more intense form of luge because skeleton competitors leap onto the sled and slide downhill head first. Skeleton athletes can reach up to 80 mph on straightaways, causing forces up to 5g, so the helmet is a critical component for attitude as well as safety.

Shortlisted images in the running to be crowned Photobox Instagram photograph of the year range from furry friends to the Holi festival to the meaning of love. Judges, including the Guardian’s former picture editor Eamonn McCabe, have whittled down 180,000 submissions to unearth a shortlist that celebrates the best of social media. Winners will be announced October 3, 2018. Here: Najac, France. Travel shortlist. (Photo by Aaron Jenkin/@aaronjenkin)

In this May 24, 2017, photo, DriveTanks.com customers drive on a tank course at Ox Ranch in Uvalde, Texas. The ranch is a free-roaming range filled with exotic animals, some to hunt, and home to DriveTanks.com, where tourists pay to transport themselves into another era and another life. (Photo by Michael Ciaglo/Houston Chronicle via AP Photo)

“This grey adult male seal enjoys a good grin while lying on the beach”. (Photo by Michael Hutch/SplashdownDirect via Rex USA)

This strange coral-looking specimen is actually a mushroom. The photo, “Beautiful Destroyer”, was taken in the Panamanian tropical rainforest where the mushroom produces nitrogen, an element vital to soil health. (Photo by Sarah A. Batterman)

A Goodfellow's Tree Kangaroo joey with its mother at Sydney Zoo in Australia on January 22, 2021. The 28-week-old male joey, who is yet to be named, has only just begun to pop his head and shoulders out of his mum's pouch. (Photo by Taronga Zoo via Reuters)

Penitentiary system guards carry an inmate with symptoms related to the novel coronavirus at the COVID-19 unit of San Juan de Dios hospital in Guatemala City on July 13, 2020. (Photo by Johan Ordonez/AFP Photo)