Photo of the Day 17 June 2008


Afar Cattle Herders, Ethiopia, 2005
Photograph by Carsten Peter
Zebu cattle driven by Afar herdsmen raise clouds of dust in the baked Danakil Desert near Semerea, Ethiopia. The Danakil is among the most forbidding places on Earth, a land of dry sands, active volcanoes, burning salt flats, temperatures that often top 120 degrees Fahrenheit (49 degrees Celsius), choking winds, and suffocating days of no wind at all.