At 10,582 square kilometres, the Bolivian salt flats – otherwise known as Salar de Uyuni – are the largest on the planet and contain between 50 and 70% of the world’s lithium reserves. After exploring Chile and Argentina, photographer Joel Santos decided to travel to Bolivia in January 2017 to check the salt flats off his bucket list. With an electrical storm rolling in, Joel and his two travelling companions were the only souls left on the vast flats and captured the eerie flats without a person in sight. (Photo by Joel Santos/Barcroft Images)

Rescue workers stand near dead bodies washed ashore in Ton Sai Bay in Thailand's Phi Phi island in this December 28, 2004 file photo. On December 26, 2004, a magnitude 9.15 quake off the coast of Indonesia's Aceh province triggered an Indian Ocean tsunami that killed around 226,000 people in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand and nine other countries. (Photo by Luis Enrique Ascui/Reuters)

Shemika Charles limbos under her car at Niagara Falls State Park on May 28, 2015 in Buffalo, New York. A world record holding limbo queen thinks she has become the first person to shimmy under a car. Shemika Charles amazed herself and onlookers when she bent over backwards to get underneath the SUV earlier this week. The supple 22-year-old entered the record books in 2010 when she limboed down to an incredible eight and a half inches – the height of a beer bottle. She trains for up to four hours a day to keep her body in peak condition and now travels around America performing with her family. However, regular performances put an incredible strain on her body and she sees a chiropractor once a week to have her hips realigned. Her mother was also a successful limbo dancer in her home country of Trinidad and Tobago but had to give up due to injury. (Photo by Ruaridh Connellan/Barcroft USA)

A Lebanese man dressed with a Santa Claus outfit rides on a standup paddle in Lebanon's northern coastal city of Batroun on December 22, 2020. (Photo by Ibrahim Chalhoub/AFP Photo)

An elephant with a shackled leg is pictured at the Hanoi Zoo in Hanoi on August 16, 2023. Legs in iron chains and unable to roam freely, the treatment of two elderly elephants at the Hanoi public zoo has drawn outrage from animal lovers across Vietnam. (Photo by Nhac Nguyen/AFP Photo)

This photograph taken on June 4, 2022 shows fish vendor Somporn Thathom sitting at her stall as a passenger train passes through the Mae Klong railway market in Samut Songkhram province, around 80 kms (50 miles) southwest of Bangkok. Six times a day at the market, local customers and foreign tourists scramble into nooks and crannies while vendors calmly move their woven baskets of goods away from the tracks and close their umbrellas. (Photo by Manan Vatsyayana/AFP Photo)

A woman looks on during a protest asking for the release of Israeil and German people held by Hamas in Gaza, outside the Germany embassy in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, October 25, 2023. (Photo by Francisco Seco/AP Photo)

“The Net thrower”. The fisherman are conducting activities on Situgunung Lake. Photo location: Situgunung lake, Sukabumi, West Java, Indonesia. (Photo and caption by Dody Kusuma/National Geographic Photo Contest)